L  I  B  RAR.Y 

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cop.  4 


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INDIANA  HISTORICAL  SOCIETY  PUBLICATIONS 
VOL.  7  NO.  10 


ABRAHAM   LINCOLN 
LAWYER 


BY 

CHARLES  W.  MOORES 


(Reprinted  from  the  Proceedings  of  the  American  Bar  Association, 
1910,  and  Enlarged.    Reprinted,  1929) 


GREENFIELD,    IND. 
WM.    MITCHELL,   PRINTING  CO. 

1922 


ABRAHAM  LINCOLN,  LAWYER 

It  is  not  so  many  years  since  a  simple-minded  country 
lawyer  from  the  prairies  of  Illinois,  standing  before  the  Capi- 
tol, pledged  himself,  for  a  second  time,  to  "preserve,  protect, 
and  defend  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States."  He  had 
walked  through  the  valley  of  the  shadow  of  death,  and  the 
people  to  whom  he  spoke  had  walked  with  him.  A  sudden 
sunshine  fell  upon  his  care-worn  face  as  he  closed  his  appeal : 
"With  malice  toward  none ;  with  charity  for  all ;  with  firmness 
in  the  right,  as  God  gives  us  to  see  the  right,  let  us  strive  on 
to  finish  the  work  we  are  in ;  to  bind  up  the  nation's  wounds ; 
to  care  for  him  who  shall  have  borne  the  battle,  and  for  his 
widow,  and  his  orphan — to  do  all  which  may  achieve  and 
cherish  a  just  and  lasting  peace  among  ourselves,  and  with  all 
nations."  Four  years  earlier,  standing  before  a  multitude  who 
neither  understood  nor  trusted  him,  he  had  said  to  his  "dis- 
satisfied fellow  countrymen :"  "We  are  not  enemies,  but 
friends.  We  must  not  be  enemies.  Though  passion  may  have 
strained,  it  must  not  break  our  bonds  of  affection.  The  mystic 
chords  of  memory,  stretching  from  every  battle  field  and  pa- 
triot grave  to  every  living  heart  and  hearthstone  all  over  this 
broad  land,  will  yet  swell  the  chorus  of  the  Union  when  again 
touched,  as  surely  they  will  be,  by  the  better  angels  of  our 
nature." 

Ever  since,  men  have  asked  the  questions:  Who  taught 
him  ?  Where  did  he  gain  the  power  to  say  so  simply  the  words 
that  have  stayed  in  the  memories  and  hearts  of  men  through  all 
these  years  ? 

483 


484  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,   LAWYER 

There  was  nothing  extraordinary  about  it.  This  simple- 
minded  country  lawyer  had  sprung  from  good  Southern  stock. 
The  Lincolns  had  been  pioneers  in  New  England,  Pennsylvania, 
Virginia,  and  Kentucky,  and  they  included  in  their  connection 
men  of  mark  and  men  of  character.  Abraham  Lincoln  had  the 
training  of  a  devoted  stepmother,  the  encouragement  of  loyal 
friends,  and  the  inspiration  of  a  brilliant  rival  who  was  like- 
wise his  friend.  Poverty  had  beset  him  and  had  spurred  him 
to  success.  How  this  discipline  made  a  lawyer  of  him,  and 
how  his  training  at  the  law  made  him  what  he  was,  it  is  the 
purpose  of  this  paper  to  show. 

His  Indiana  boyhood  gave  him  the  same  opportunities 
that  came  to  other  Hoosier  boys.  When,  in  his  eagerness  to 
know  what  the  outside  world  was  doing,  he  ran  to  the  road- 
side to  hail  the  passing  emigrant  and  ask  questions,  his  father 
thought  him  lazy  and  drove  him  back  to  his  work.  And  when, 
late  at  night,  he  lingered  by  the  fireplace  to  ask  other  questions 
of  the  wayfarer  who  had  come  out  of  the  busy  East,  his  father 
failed  to  understand,  and  banished  him,  reluctant,  to  his  bed, 
where  he  left  the  world  of  conscious  learning  for  the  world  of 
dreams  in  which  he  chiefly  lived. 

"I  remember,"  this  boy  has  said,  "how  when  a  mere  child, 
I  used  to  get  irritated  when  anybody  talked  to  me  in  a  way 
I  could  not  understand.  I  do  not  think  I  ever  got  angry  at 
anything  else  in  my  life ;  but  that  always  disturbed  my  tem- 
per. I  can  remember  going  to  my  little  room,  after  hearing 
the  neighbors  talk  of  an  evening  with  my  father,  and  spending 
no  small  part  of  the  night  walking  up  and  down  trying  to 
make  out  the  exact  meaning  of  their,  to  me,  dark  sayings.  I 
could  not  sleep,  although  I  tried  to,  when  I  got  on  such  a  hunt 
for  an  idea,  until  I  had  caught  it ;  and  when  I  thought  I  had 
got  it  I  was  not  satisfied  until  I  had  repeated  it  over  and  over 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER  485 

again;  until  I  had  put  it  in  language  plain  enough,  so  I 
thought,  for  any  boy  I  knew  to  comprehend.  This  was  a  kind 
of  passion  with  me,  and  it  has  stuck  by  me,  for  I  am  never 
easy  now  when  I  am  handling  a  thought,  till  I  have  bounded 
it  north,  and  bounded  it  south,  and  bounded  it  east,  and 
bounded  it  west." 

At  four  years  old,  at  ten,  at  fourteen,  and  at  seventeen, 
each  time  for  perhaps  a  month,  the  boy  whose  ambition  was 
to  learn  to  express  a  thought  so  plainly  "that  any  boy  he  knew 
could  comprehend"  was  permitted  to  go  to  school.  His 
teachers  were  not  educational  specialists,*  but  they  were  men 
of  affairs  who  stimulated  public  spirit  and  ambition  in  the  boy. 
The  influence  of  these  men  of  affairs,  as  well  as  of  the  groups 
of  the  illiterate,  who,  at  the  country  store  of  Gentryville,  ad- 
miringly drew  the  boy  out,  is  not  to  be  ignored  by  one  who 
would  trace  Lincoln's  talents  to  their  sources. 

It  is  said  that  Lincoln  as  a  boy  used  to  walk  fifteen  miles 
to  Boonville  to  attend  court.  On  one  of  these  occasions  he 
was  so  impressed  with  the  brilliant  conduct  of  his  case  by  a 
lawyer  named  Brackenridge  that  he  introduced  himself  (but 
the  ungainly  youth  made  no  progress  in  the  acquaintance) 
and  got  snubbed.  Forty  years  later  at  the  White  House,  Presi- 
dent Lincoln  rem'nded  Mr.  Brackenridge  of  the  trial  which  had 
left  such  a  deep  impression  on  his  mind.  It  was  in  these 
country  courts  in  Indiana  and  Illinois  that  there  gathered 
from  miles  around  men  into  whose  colorless  lives  the  incidents 


*They  were  Zachariah  Riney,  who  is  buried  within  the  Trappist 
monastery  of  Gethsemane,  and  Crawford,  a  lifelong  resident  of  Spen- 
cer county,  Indiana,  and  a  justice  of  the  peace,  and  Dorsey,  coroner 
and  county  treasurer,  library  and  bridge  trustee,  who  led  in  every  move- 
ment for  the  public  good,  and  the  boy's  friend,  John  Pitcher,  legislator 
and  judge,  who  lent  him  the  Indiana  statutes  and  planted  in  his  breast 
that  interest  in  the  law  for  which  he  came  to  hunger  and  thirst  as  for 
righteousness  itself. 


486  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER 

of  a  trial  at  law  brought  much  that  was  of  absorbing  interest. 
"The  court  rooms  were  always  crowded,"  writes  Mr.  Arnold,* 
Lincoln's  colleague  and  biographer.  "To  go  to  court  and  listen 
to  the  witnesses  and  lawyers  was  among  the  chief  amusements 
of  the  frontier  settlement.  At  court  were  rehearsed  and  en- 
acted the  tragedy  and  comedy  of  real  life.  The  court  room 
answered  for  the  theater,  concert  hall,  and  opera,  of  the  older 
settlements.  The  judges  and  lawyers  were  the  stars,  and  wit 
and  humor,  pathos  and  eloquence,  always  had  appreciative 
audiences." 

In  1830  came  the  migration  to  Illinois.  The  boy,  now 
twenty-one,  took  the  lead,  driving  the  oxen,  and  peddling 
from  house  to  house  the  little  stock  of  notions  he  had  laid  in 
for  this  matchless  commercial  opportunity.  He  was  spokes- 
man as  well  as  leader,  and  plied  every  wayfarer  with  questions 
about  the  doings  of  men  in  the  political  and  social  life  of  the 
sociable  West. 

In  Indiana  Abraham  Lincoln,  being  under  twenty-one,  had 
been  his  father's  serf.  In  the  Land  of  Full  Grown  Men — for 
that  was  the  meaning  of  the  Indian  name  Illinois — he  was 
now  emancipated  by  law.  For  a  few  years  more  he  was  still 
to  do  the  bidding  of  other  men  as  laborer  and  clerk.  As  his 
thirst  for  knowledge,  his  social  instinct,  and  his  ambition, 
brought  him  more  and  more  into  the  fellowship  of  men,  he 
was  not  slow  to  abandon  the  "hired  man's"  job  and  begin  to 
climb. 

The  story  of  the  Black  Hawk  war  of  1832,  young  Lincoln 
winning  his  captaincy  by  his  physical  prowess,  as  Saul  and 
David  won  their  kingdom,  is  the  story  of  Lincoln's  awakening 
to  the  possibilities  of  a  political  career.     On  this  summertime 


*Isaac  N.  Arnold,  "Reminiscences  of  the  Illinois  Bar,  Forty  Years 
Ago,"  in  Fergus'  Historical  Series,  Vol.  23,  No.  14  (Chicago,  1881). 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER  487 

frolic  he  won  renown  as  an  athlete  and  a  teller  of  stories.  He 
was  not  averse  to  earning  a  dollar  in  a  foot  race  or  a  wrestling 
match,  but  what  was  more  to  the  point,  he  gained  among 
those  two  or  three  thousand  pioneer  soldiers  the  good  will  of 
many  who  in  later  years  were  to  be  his  supporters  in  politics, 
his  clients,  and  his  colleagues  at  the  law.  Here  too  he  won 
the  friendship  of  his  major,  John  T.  Stuart,  who,  two  years 
later  served  with  him  in  the  Illinois  legislature.  Major  Stuart 
was  already  a  successful  practitioner.  Stuart  encouraged  Lin- 
coln to  study  law,  and  after  the  election  lent  him  books.  These 
the  young  man  carried  with  him  as  he  walked  back  and  forth 
between  Springfield  and  New  Salem.  Both  before  the  session 
and  later,  when,  the  burdens  of  state  being  laid  aside,  the 
princely  income  of  three  dollars  a  day  became  no  longer  avail- 
able, he  plunged  into  his  studies.  He  was  admitted  to  the  bar 
and  removed  to  Springfield  in  1837.  The  advertisement  in 
the  Sangamo  Journal,   dated   April    12,    1837,   proclaims   that 

"J-  T.  Stuart  and  A.  Lincoln,  Attorneys  and  Counsellors 
at  Law,  will  practice  conjointly  in  the  courts  of  this  judicial 
circuit.     Office  No.  4,  Hoffman  Row,  upstairs." 

The  first  circuit  extended  from  Alton  to  the  Wisconsin 
line.  Despite  the  paucity  of  population  and  the  difficulties  of 
transportation,  it  offered  a  tempting  field  for  professional  ac- 
tivity. These  very  obstacles  made  opportunities  for  him.  He 
throve  on  hardships  and  exposure,  and  made  his  iron  consti- 
tution and  his  gigantic  physical  strength  serve  his  clients' 
necessities  as  no  other  lawyer  of  that  day  could. 

Before  his  removal  to  Springfield,  Lincoln  had  served  two 
terms  in  the  legislature;  and  had  been  postmaster  under  a 
democratic  president.  The  meager  income  from  this  source 
was  increased  substantially  by  a  three  dollar  per  diem  earned 
by  him  as  deputy  under  a  democratic  county  surveyor,  John 


488  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER 

Calhoun,  who  afterwards  made  a  name  for  himself  in  the 
flaming  pre-war  politics  of  Kansas.  The  surveys  of  Petersburg 
and  Albany,  Illinois,  are  among  those  on  file  in  the  records 
of  Menard  and  Logan  counties,  with  the  certificate  of  A.  Lin- 
coln as  deputy  under  John  Calhoun  and  another  county  sur- 
veyor, T.  M.  Neale.  These  two  positions  enabled  him  to  con- 
tinue his  studies  and  to  undertake  a  mercantile  venture  whose 
early  collapse  burdened  him  for  years  with  what  he  was  wont 
to  call  "the  national  debt/' 

A  customer  at  this  store  of  Berry  and  Lincoln  at  New 
Salem  might  have  sought  in  vain  for  Berry,  the  drunkard. 
Lincoln  he  might  have  found  lying  on  his  back  in  the  grass — 
feet  propped  high  against  the  shady  side  of  a  tree,  and  lank 
body  slowly  squirming  about  to  keep  out  of  the  sun, — his  mind 
so  absorbed  in  Blackstone  that  he  seemed  wholly  indifferent 
to  business.  It  was  while  he  was  managing  partner  of  Berry 
and  Lincoln's  department  store  that  he  started  his  law  library. 
As  he  tells  it :  "A  man  who  was  migrating  to  the  west  drove 
up  with  a  wagon  which  contained  his  household  plunder.  He 
asked  if  I  would  buy  an  old  barrel,  .  .  .  which  he  said  con- 
tained nothing  of  special  value.  I  paid  a  half  dollar  for  it, 
put  it  away,  and  forgot  all  about  it.  Some  time  after,  I  came 
upon  the  barrel  and  emptying  it  I  found  at  the  bottom  a  com- 
plete edition  of  Blackstone's  Commentaries.  I  began  to  read 
those  famous  works  and  I  had  plenty  of  time,  for  during  the 
long  summer  days  when  the  farmers  were  busy  with  their 
crops,  my  customers  were  few  and  far  between.  The  more 
I  read,  the  more  intensely  interested  I  became.  Never  in  my 
life  was  my  mind  so  absorbed." 

From  this  unpromising  beginning  to  the  far-off  day  in 
1864,  when  he  received  the  degree  of  Doctor  of  Laws  from 
Princeton  University,  the  evolution  of  the  lawyer  is  the  story 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER  489 

of  patient  growth  in  that  fine  sense  for  the  feeling  of  others 
and  a  recognition  of  their  point  of  view  which  marks  the  gen- 
tleman,— a  spiritual  growth,  and  a  growth  in  wisdom  and  in 
power. 

Two  letters,  written  years  later,  throw  some  light  on  his 
method  of  preparing  for  the  law.  To  a  young  friend  he 
wrote  in  1855 : 

"If  you  are  resolutely  determined  to  make  a  lawyer  of 
yourself  the  thing  is  more  than  half  done  already.  It  is  a 
small  matter  whether  you  read  with  anybody  or  not.  I  did 
not  read  with  any  one.  Get  the  books  and  read  and  study 
them  till  you  understand  them  in  their  every  feature,  and  that 
is  the  main  thing.  It  is  of  no  consequence  to  be  in  a  large 
town  while  you  are  reading.  I  read  at  New  Salem,  which 
never  had  three  hundred  people  in  it.  The  books  and  your 
capacity  for  understanding  them  are  just  the  same  in  all  places. 
.  .  .  Always  bear  in  mind  that  your  own  resolution  to  suc- 
ceed is  more  important  than  any  other  one  thing." 

To  another  he  wrote  in  1860 : 

"Yours  asking  the  'best  method  of  obtaining  a  thorough 
knowledge  of  the  law'  is  received.  The  mode  is  very  simple, 
though  laborious  and  tedious.  It  is  only  to  get  the  books  and 
read  and  study  them  carefully.  Begin  with  Blackstone's  Com- 
mentaries and  after  reading  it  through,  say  twice,  take  up 
Chitty's  Pleadings,  Greenleaf's  Evidence,  and  Story's  Equity, 
etc.,  in  succession.    Work,  work,  work,  is  the  main  thing." 

Earlier  in  his  career  than  the  Blackstone  incident  is  the 
acquisition,  by  some  process  now  forgotten,  of  the  Indiana 
Revised  Statutes  of  1824.  This  was  probably  Lincoln's  first 
law  book.  Its  value  to  the  young  lawyer  must  have  been 
political  rather  than  professional.  It  contained  the  Declaration 
of  Independence,  the  Ordinance  of   1787  creating  the   North- 


490  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER 

west  Territory,  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States,  and  the 
Constitution  of  Indiana.  In  the  Ordinance  of  1787,  and  in 
the  Indiana  constitution,  he  first  found  formal,  authoritative 
expression  of  the  people's  disapproval  of  slavery.  The  consti- 
tutional provision  was  as  follows : 

"As  the  holding  of  any  part  of  the  human  creation  is 
slavery  .  .  .  can  only  originate  in  usurpation  and  tyranny,  no 
alteration  of  this  constitution  shall  ever  take  place  so  as  to 
introduce  slavery   ...   in  this  state." 

This  book  doubtless  came  into  his  hands  in  Indiana,  whither 
his  father  had  migrated  from  Kentucky  to  escape  the  competi- 
tion of  slave  labor,  and  there  is  little  doubt  that  its  provisions 
against  slavery,  as  well  as  those  for  reclaiming  fugitive  slaves, 
helped  to  determine  his  attitude  on  a  question  which  absorbed 
so  large  a  part  of  his  life.  It  is  said  to  have  been  given  him 
by  John  Pitcher  of  Rockport. 

At  New  Salem  Lincoln  boarded  with  a  justice  of  the  peace 
who  bore  the  odd  name  of  Bowling  Green,  and  studied  Kirk- 
ham's  Grammar  under  Menter  Graham,  the  impecunious  vil- 
lage schoolmaster,  and  read  and  committed  to  memory  the 
poems  of  Burns  and  the  plays  of  Shakespeare  which  he  bor- 
rowed from  Graham.  New  Salem  is  no  longer  even  a  deserted 
village.  The  store  where  Lincoln  kept  post  office  and  created 
"the  national  debt"  is  demolished  and,  board  by  board,  is  being 
made  over  into  souvenirs.  The  village  is  no  longer  even  a 
memory  to  the  octogenarians  of  Menard  county. 

In  the  files  of  the  Circuit  Court  at  Petersburg,  a  mile  from 
New  Salem,  is  still  to  be  seen  a  declaration  in  Lincoln's  hand- 
writing, in  the  case  of  Nancy  Green  versus  Menter  Graham 
which  shows  how  the  young  lawyer  had  to  shut  his  eyes  to 
Menter  Graham's  claims  upon  his  friendship  in  order  to  serve 
Nancy  Green's  necessities.  A  facsimile,  or  "sick  family"  as 
Lincoln  called  it,  accompanies  this  paper. 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER  491 

Before  justices  of  the  peace,  in  the  circuit  courts  of  forty- 
five  different  counties  in  Illinois,  and  occasionally  in  Indiana, 
in  the  federal  courts  of  Illinois,  Ohio  and  probably  Missouri, 
in  the  state  and  federal  supreme  courts,  the  practice  that  Abra- 
ham Lincoln  built  up  in  twenty  years  was  remarkable.  In 
the  court  reports  and  in  the  nisi  prius  dockets  is  to  be  found 
every  conceivable  variety  of  cases.* 

It  would  be  a  mistake  to  imagine  that  there  were  not 
plenty  of  lawyers  to  conduct  the  litigation,  or  that  there  was 
any  monopolizing  of  the  practice  by  a  few  men.  Thus,  in 
Eighth  Illinois,  containing  cases  decided  in  1845  and  1846, 
Lincoln  had  seventeen  cases,  but  eighty-three  other  lawyers  in 
the  same  volume  had  from  one  to  sixteen  cases  each.  When 
Tenth  Illinois  was  published  in  1849,  a  thousand  lawyers  were 
enrolled  in  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  State.  "The  days  of  men's 
innocency"  had  already  passed. 

The  office  docket,  containing  a  partial  account  of  the 
transactions  of  the  three  firms  of  Stuart  and  Lincoln,  Logan 
and  Lincoln,  and  Lincoln  and  Herndon,  between  1838  and 
1860,  is  still  to  be  seen  at  Springfield.  It  contains  some  four 
hundred  entries  of  service  rendered,   omitting  many  cases  in 


*Some  of  the  subjects  of  these  cases  may  be  of  interest;  jurisdiction 
of  justice  of  the  peace,  the  validity  of  a  slave  as  the  consideration  for  a 
promissory  note,  enforcement  of  gambling  debts,  seduction,  fraud,  sale 
of  real  estate  of  decedent,  guardianships,  mortgage  and  mechanic's  lien 
foreclosure,  divorce,  specific  performance,  suretyship,  county  seat  wars, 
ejectment,  wills,  the  defense  and  sometimes  the  prosecution  of  crimes, 
damages  for  personal  injuries,  for  prairie  fires,  rescission,  slander,  fees 
and  salaries,  mandate,  quo  warranto,  injunction,  replevin,  patents,  taxa- 
tion, insurance,  carriers,  partition,  liquor  questions,  political  questions, 
statute  of  frauds,  railway  stock  subscriptions,  eminent  domain,  trusts 
and  trustees,  questions  of  constitutional  law,  and  procedure  at  law  and  in 
chancery.  In  the  circuit  courts,  where  Lincoln  was  often  employed  at 
the  time  the  case  was  called  for  trial  no  case  seemed  too  small  to  com- 
mand his  service.  The  trials  in  that  day  indicated  a  litigious  disposition 
in  the  community  which  has  happily  disappeared  with  the  advance  of 
civilization. 


492  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER 

which  we  know  Lincoln  to  have  been  employed.  The  extent  of 
these  employments  it  is  impossible  now  to  learn,  for  the  fed- 
eral court  records  of  Judges  Pope  and  Treat  and  Justice  Mc- 
Lean were  destroyed  in  the  Chicago  fire  and  the  court  dockets 
in  many  counties  fail  to  indicate  the  names  of  counsel,  while  in 
all  the  records  are  incomplete. 

Mr.  Frederick  Trevor  Hill,  in  his  admirable  work,  Lin- 
coln the  Lawyer,  publishes  a  list  of  172  cases  in  the  Illinois 
Supreme  Court,  in  which  Lincoln's  name  appears  as  attorney 
of  record.    To  this  list  three  others  should  be  added : 

Cunningham  vs.  Fithian,  in  6th  111.,  269.  (His  name  was  omitted 
by  the  official  reporter.  See  7  111.,  650)  and  State  of  Illinois  vs.  Illinois 
Central,  etc.,  Co.,  27  111.,  64,  and  Walker  vs.  Herrick,  18  111.,  570,  a 
suit  brought  and  won  for  the  Illinois  Central  Railroad  Co.,  under  his 
direction. 

In  relation  to  the  foregoing,  the  Illinois  Central  Railroad 
Company,  in  a  brochure,  privately  published,  mentions  Walker 
vs.  Herrick,  18  111.,  570,  a  suit  involving  the  validity  of  certain 
land  grants  which  was  brought  upon  Lincoln's  advice  and  won 
upon  the  theory  advanced  by  him  in  his  written  opinion  given 
to  the  railroad  company  in  1856. 

The  reports  of  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States 
contain  several  Illinois  cases  in  which  the  names  of  counsel  are 
not  given.  Three  of  Lincoln's  cases  are  there  reported,  how- 
ever. 

United  States  vs.  Chicago,*  7  How.  (U.  S.)  185;  Lincoln  for 
appellee. 

Lewis,  for  the  use  of  Nicholas  Longworth  vs.  Lewis,  7  How. 
(U.  S.)  775;  Lincoln  for  appellee. 

Forsyth  vs.  Reynolds,  15  How.  (U.  S.)  358;  Lincoln  for  defend- 
ant. 


*That  Lincoln  appeared  in  this  case  although  his  name  is  omitted 
from  the  official  report  is  stated  on  the  authority  of  the  Clerk  of  the 
Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States. 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER  493 

In  the  reports  of  the  federal  courts,  incomplete  as  they 
were,  thirteen  of  his  cases  appear.** 

From  these  reported  cases  it  would  seem  that  Lincoln  was 
open  to  the  charge  of  being  a  corporation  lawyer,  which  in 
these  later  days  of  class-conscious  democracy  is  an  obstacle 
to  political  advancement.  At  a  time  when  corporations  carried 
on  but  a  small  part  of  the  business  or  the  litigation,  his  regular 
clientage  included  all  classes  of  municipal  corporations,  besides 
mercantile  and  manufacturing  companies,  banks,  insurance 
companies  and  railroads — the  last  named  including  the  Illinois 
Central,  the  Atlantic,  the  Alton  and  Sangamon,  and  the  Tonica 
and  Petersburg  roads. 

His  request  for  a  renewal  of  his  pass  as  attorney  for  the 
Alton  is  in  his  characteristic  humor: 


**These  are: 

Lincoln  vs.  Tower,  2  McLean,  473;  Lincoln  for  plaintiff. 

January  vs.  Duncan,  3  McLean,  19;  Logan  &  Lincoln  for  plaintiff. 

Sturtevant  vs.  City  of  Alton,  3  McLean,  393;  Logan  &  Lincoln  for 
defendant. 

Lewis  vs.  Administrators  of  Broadwell,  3  McLean,  568;  Logan  & 
Lincoln  for  defendant. 

Voce  vs.  Lawrence,  4  McLean,  203 ;  Lincoln  for  plaintiff. 

Lafayette  Bank  vs.  State  Bank  of  Illinois,  4  McLean,  208;  Lincoln 
for  plaintiff. 

Moore  vs.  Brown,  4  McLean,  211;  Lincoln  for  defendant. 

Kemper  vs.  Adams,  5  McLean,  507;  Logan  for  plaintiff.  Lincoln 
for  defendant. 

United  States  vs.  Prentice,  6  McLean,  65 ;  Logan  &  Lincoln  for 
defendant. 

Columbus  Insurance  Co.  vs.  Peoria  Bridge  Ass'n,  6  McLean,  70; 
Lincoln  for  plaintiff.     Logan  for  defendant. 

United  States  vs.  Railroad  &  Bridge  Co.,  6  McLean,  516;  Lincoln 
for  defendant. 

McCormick  vs.  Manny,  6  McLean,  539;  Lincoln  for  defendant. 


494  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,   LAWYER 

"Feb.  13/56 
R.  P.  Morgan,  Esq. 

Dear  Sir, 
Says  Tom  to  John  'Here's  your  old  rotten  wheelbarrow, 
I've  broke  it  usin'  on  it.    I  wish  you  would  mend  it  case  I  shall 
want  to  borrow  it  this  arter-noon.' 

Acting  on  this  as  a  precedent,  I  say,  'Here's  your  old 
'Chalked  Hat.'*  I  wish  you  would  take  it  and  send  me  a  new 
one ;  case  I  shall  want  to  use  it  the  first  of  March.' 

Yours  truly, 

A.  Lincoln." 

Of  the  one  hundred  and  seventy-five  cases  in  the  Illinois 
reports  he  won  ninety-two  and  lost  eighty-three ;  of  the  ten 
cases  in  McLean's  reports  (U.  S.  Cir.  Ct.)  whose  final  de- 
cision is  given  he  won  seven ;  and  of  the  three  cases  in  the 
U.  S.  Supreme  Court  he  won  two. 

In  the  legislature  of  1834  Lincoln  served  with  John  T. 
Stuart,  Stephen  T.  Logan  and  Stephen  A.  Douglas.  The 
legislature  of  1836  brought  together  a  remarkable  group  of 
great  men,  Lincoln  and  Douglas,  Stuart  and  Logan,  Edward 
D.  Baker,  afterwards  senator  from  Oregon,  Orville  H.  Brown- 
ing, afterwards  senator  and  Secretary  of  the  Interior,  James 
A.  Shields,  afterwards  general  in  the  Civil  War  and  senator 
from  three  different  states,  John  A.  McClernand,  afterwards 
congressman  and  general  in  the  Civil  War,  Dan  Stone,  after- 
wards circuit  judge  but  remembered  only  for  the  protest 
against  slavery  which  he  and  Lincoln  registered  on  the  legis- 
lative journals  of  that  session,  William  A.  Richardson,  later 
"LL  S.  senator,  John  A.  Logan,  general  and  senator,  and  John 
J.   Hardin, — all   of   them  brilliant  men  and    soon   to  become 


*The  vernacular  for  pass. 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER  495 

leaders  of  the  bar  of  the  young  state.  The  chief  value  of  this 
legislative  experience  to  the  young  lawyer  was  in  the  oppor- 
tunity it  gave  him  to  enlarge  his  acquaintance  among  his  own 
profession.  The  laws  passed  from  1835  to  1839  did  not  call 
for  the  wisdom  of  Solon.  Besides  the  internal  improvement 
acts,  about  the  only  creative  legislation  then  enacted  is  a  series 
of  statutes  declaring  Spoon  River,  Crooked  River,  The  Snicar- 
ty,  Skillet  Fork,  and  others  of  their  kind,  to  be  navigable 
streams.  And  these  enactments  suggest  Lincoln's  familiar 
conundrum:  "Calling  a  dog's  tail  a  leg,  how  many  legs  has 
he?" 

Lincoln  came  to  Springfield  penniless  but  by  no  means 
friendless.  As  one  of  the  "Long  Nine"  from  Sangamon 
County  he  had  been  the  chief  factor  in  their  successful  effort 
to  remove  the  capital  from  Vandalia  to  Springfield,  a  service 
for  which  the  people  of  Springfield  did  not  lack  appreciation. 
The  invitation  to  a  partnership  with  Major  John  T.  Stuart 
was  a  compliment,  and  the  new  association  gave  him  a  posi- 
tion at  the  bar  and  in  the  community  which  would  not  other- 
wise have  been  his  so  soon.  Although  Stuart's  long  absences 
while  campaigning  and  at  Congress  diminished  the  income  of 
the  firm,  they  threw  responsibilities  upon  young  Lincoln  and 
gave  him  confidence  in  himself. 

Lincoln  was  enrolled  as  a  member  of  the  bar  of  the  Illinois 
Supreme  Court  on  March  1,  1837.  He  was  admitted  to  practice 
in  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States  at  the  November 
term,  1848.    He  was  never  without  a  partner. 

The  partnership  with  Major  Stuart  commenced  April 
12,  1837,*  and  continued  for  four  years. 


*Stuart  gives  it  April  27,  1837,  but  the  advertisement  in  the  Sanga- 
mo  Journal  is  dated  April    12,  and  is  no  doubt  authoritative. 


496  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER 

Stuart  was  two  years  older,  a  man  of  commanding  pres- 
ence, of  dignified  and  courtly  manners,  quick  to  make  friends 
and  able  to  hold  them  loyally  to  himself.  He  was  a  graduate 
of  a  Kentucky  college  and  an  old-fashioned,  polished  gentle- 
man, a  successful  lawyer,  and  always  a  politician.  This  inti- 
mate association  of  four  years,  with  a  common  interest  in  the 
law  and  in  politics,  was  worth  much  to  the  junior  partner. 

The  old  office  docket  for  this  period  contains  many  entries 
of  interest,  showing  the  character  of  the  early  practice  and 
the  fees  charged.  An  entry  in  1838  reads :  ''Lincoln  rec'd 
of  Z.  Peter  $2.81^  cents  which  is  taken  in  full  of  all  ballances 
due  up  to  this  date."  Another:  "Johnson  v.  Gay.  Forcible 
Detainer.  Before  Justice  Clement.  Paid  Lincoln  by  board 
$6." 

A  third  shows  a  charge  of  $7.50  for  a  proceeding  to  sell 
a  decedent's  real  estate  to  pay  debts,  and  a  payment  of  the 
account  in  three  installments. 

The  firm  of  Logan  and  Lincoln  lasted  from  April  14,  1841, 
until  September  20,  1843.  Judge  Logan  had  been  circuit  judge 
from  1835  to  1837  and  had  resigned  his  place  at  a  salary  of 
$750  a  year  to  take  up  what  for  some  years  was  probably  the 
largest  general  practice  at  the  Illinois  bar.  He  was  nine 
years  older  than  Lincoln.  Elihu  B.  Washburne  describes 
Logan  as  "A  small  thin  man,  with  a  little,  wrinkled,  wizened 
face,  set  off  by  an  immense  head  of  hair  which  might  be  called 
frowsy.  He  was  dressed  in  linsey  woolsey  and  wore  very 
heavy  shoes.  His  shirt  was  of  unbleached  cotton  and  un- 
starched and  he  never  incumbered  himself  with  a  cravat.  His 
voice  was  shrill,  sharp,  and  unpleasant,  and  he  had  not  a  single 
grace  of  oratory ;  but  when  he  spoke  he  always  had  interested 
and  attentive  listeners.  Underneath  this  curious  and  grotesque 
exterior  there  was  a  gigantic  intellect." 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER  497 

Just  why  the  partnership  was  so  brief  has  not  been  told. 
Perhaps  Lincoln  did  not  accommodate  himself  enough  to 
Judge  Logan's  ideas  and  was  too  easy  going  and  unmethodi- 
cal, and  too  independent  of  any  sort  of  restraint ;  perhaps  the 
ambition  of  both  men  to  go  to  Congress  made  it  hard  for  them 
to  work  in  harmony.  At  all  events  the  firm  prospered  and 
Logan  was  its  controlling  spirit.  Lincoln  was  an  unsuccessful 
candidate  for  the  congressional  nomination  during  this  period, 
although  later  he  was  elected  for  one  term.  Logan  became  his 
successor  on  the  Whig  ticket,  but  was  defeated.  The  only 
pleadings  of  the  firm  to  be  found  in  the  files  of  Sangamon 
county  are  in  Judge  Logan's  handwriting.  Unless  Lincoln's 
autographs  of  this  period  have  been  stolen,  this  would  indicate 
that  Logan  kept  the  reins  of  authority  in  his  own  hands.  Prac- 
tically all  of  the  pleadings  of  Stuart  and  Lincoln  and  of  Lin- 
coln and  Herndon — many  of  which  I  have  seen — are 
in  Lincoln's  hand,  and  as  clear  as  if  written  yesterday. 
They  cover  so  many  sheets,  in  the  old  Sangamon  County 
files,  and  in  some  other  counties  where  the  thief  has  not  yet 
been,  that  one  wonders  how  Lincoln  had  time  for  anything 
else.  All  are  written  with  laborious  care.  The  apt  word  is 
used ;  there  are  singularly  few  corrections ;  and  the  sand  then 
used  as  a  blotter  still  clings  to  the  sheets.  The  spelling  is 
reasonably  correct — much  more  so,  at  any  rate,  than  that  of 
George  Washington  in  his  autograph  manuscripts. 

It  is  easy  to  see,  without  reflecting  on  either  partner,  how 
these  two  positive  characters,  so  unlike  in  many  vital  respects, 
found  it  hard  to  work  together.  And  it  is  pleasant  to  remem- 
ber that  in  later  years,  when  Lincoln's  giant  struggle  with 
Douglas  had  made  him  a  world  figure,  Logan  was  his  devoted 
friend,  contributing  of  his  fortune,  as  well  as  of  his  store  of 
wisdom  and  influence,  to  the  advancement  of  his  former  part- 


498  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER 

ner  and  close  friend,  and,  on  that  bitter  day  in  April,  1865, 
offering  the  final  tribute  of  the  bar  to  the  memory  of  the  man 
they  loved. 

Lincoln's  choice  of  Herndon  for  a  partner  seems  a  strange 
one  after  his  close  association  with  a  man  of  Logan's  charac- 
ter and  ability,  and  particularly  in  view  of  Herndon's  subse- 
quent indifference  to  Lincoln's  high  repute.  Herndon's  father 
was  Archie  G.  Herndon,  one  of  "the  Long  Nine,"  and  a  poli- 
tician of  prominence  at  Springfield.  And  "Billy"  Herndon, 
as  he  was  called,  was  the  cousin  of  "Row"  Herndon  of  the 
Clarys  Grove  "gang"  at  New  Salem,  to  whose  support  Lincoln 
owed  his  captaincy  and  his  first  legislative  successes.  The 
young  lawyer  had  graduated  at  Jacksonville  and  had  clerked 
in  Joshua  F.  Speed's  store  where  he  was  known  as  a  scholarly 
youth  with  some  native  ability  and  more  assurance.  The  recom- 
mendation of  Speed,  Lincoln's  only  intimate  friend,  and  a 
sense  of  loyalty  toward  the  friends  of  his  earlier  days  had 
their  influence.  No  doubt,  too,  being  self-taught  and  timid 
about  his  own  attainments,  Lincoln  attached  undue  importance 
to  the  young  man's  college  training.  Herndon  helped  in  the 
trial  of  their  earlier  cases — much  as  a  law  clerk  would — and 
drove  to  Petersburg  and  nearby  county  seats  in  the  circuit, 
sometimes  with  Lincoln  and  sometimes  alone.  But,  although 
sharing  equally  in  the  earnings  of  the  firm,  he  was  not  looked 
upon  as  an  equal  participant  in  its  responsibilities,  and, — so 
we  are  told  by  a  client  of  the  firm — was  not  consulted  about 
important  matters  when  Lincoln  was  absent.  But  for  the 
Herndon  biography,  the  intimacy  of  the  association  would, 
perhaps,  be  forgotten. 

In  Springfield,  the  Supreme  Court  in  the  forties  sat  twice 
a  year,  where  the  law  required  it  to  "continue  until  the  business 
before  it  shall  be  disposed  of."     The  library  was  in  the  court 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER  499 

room.  Here  the  lawyers  from  all  over  the  state,  gathered  to 
look  up  their  authorities,  prepare  their  arguments,  and,  in 
the  evenings,  to  hold  reunions.  At  these  gatherings  Lincoln 
was  the  center  of  an  interested  group.  His  stories  amused 
them,  and  his  talk,  especially  when  stimulated  by  the  congenial 
companionship  and  esprit  de  corps  of  the  bar  of  that  day, 
always  commanded  attention. 

Lincoln's  first  case  in  the  Illinois  reports,  decided  in  1840, 
was  Scammon  v.  Cline,  3  111.,  456.  It  had  been  tried  before 
Judge  Dan  Stone  in  Boone  County  and  won  below  by  Lincoln's 
client,  but  was  reversed  by  the  Supreme  Court.  It  was  a  J.  P. 
appeal,  and  in  the  circuit  court  it  was  dismissed  on  technical 
grounds  set  up  Xpf  Lincoln.  One  of  the  Supreme  judges  who 
reversed  the  case  was  Stephen  A.  Douglas,  then  only  twenty- 
seven  years  old,  and  the  Judge  Stone  who  decided  it  below, 
was  the  man  who  had  joined  with  Lincoln  in  protest  in  the 
legislature  of  1837  against  the  extension  of  slavery. 

His  last  case  in  that  court  was  State  vs.  Illinois  Central  R. 
R.  Co.,  27  111.,  63,  involving  the  principle  that  railway  property 
must  be  taxed  at  its  present,  and  not  at  its  prospective  value, 
and  that  the  inquiry  should  be,  what  it  is  worth  for  the  pur- 
poses for  which  it  was  designed  and  not  for  any  other  pur- 
poses to  which  it  might  be  applied. 

Between  these  two  cases  are  several  in  which  new  and  im- 
portant principles  were  established  by  Abraham  Lincoln.* 


*Among  these  are : 

Bryan   vs.   Wash,    7    111.,    557,   which   has   been   cited   and    followed 
eighty-five  times. 

Griggs  vs.  Gear,  8  111.,  2,  cited  51  times. 

Perry  vs.  McHenry,  13  111.,  227,  cited  47  times. 

Ross  vs.  Irving,  14  111.,  171,  cited  33  times. 

Illinois  Central  R.  R.  Co.  vs.  Morrison,  19  111.,  136,  cited  24  times. 


500  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER 

A  list  of  these  will  be  found  in  the  appendix. 

It  is  said  that  Lincoln  was  not  learned  in  the  law.  True 
it  is  that  in  those  days  the  publication  of  court  decisions  was 
no  such  splendid  riot  of  woodpulp  and  electrotype  as  it  is  today. 
But  the  text  books  of  Greenleaf  and  Story  and  Parsons  were 
both  law  and  literature,  and  the  libraries  accessible  to  attor- 
neys were  not  made  up  then  of  machine  made  books  compiled 
and  edited  vicariously  as  they  are  today. 

With  the  library  of  the  Supreme  Court  just  across  the 
street,  there  was  no  need  for  many  books  in  the  dismal  room 
where  Lincoln  and  Herndon  held  forth.  Though  absent  from 
his  Springfield  office  much  of  the  time,  Lincoln  had  access  to 
all  the  books  that  are  the  recognized  classics  of  English  and 
American  law.  These  he  must  have  known  familiarly  for  he 
cited  them  continually  in  his  briefs. 

The  list  includes  the  Indiana  Revised  Statutes  of  1824, 
Chitty's  Pleading,  Kent's  and  Stephen's  Commentaries,  Green- 
lief  on  Evidence,  Parsons  on  Contracts,  Redfield  on  Railways, 
Angell  &  Ames  on  Corporations,  Angell  on  Limitations  and 
Story's  Equity. 

The  Springfield  law  office  has  been  described  many  times. 
In  the  reminiscences  of  the  late  J.  B.  Bennett  of  Cincinnati, 
published  in  Rough  Notes,  volume  41,  at  page  78,  appears 
this  description  of  the  man  in  his  office: 

"At  the  top  of  the  stairway  you  directly  entered  a  long 
room,  destitute  of  every  honest  claim  to  be  titled  an  office. 
It  was  a  low,  black,  schooner  sort  of  an  affair — dusty,  dingy, 
and  destitute  of  ornament,  unless  the  lawyer's  old  rusty  stove, 
like  the  one  horse  shay,  ready  to  collapse,  might  be  so  con- 
strued. The  front  part  of  the  room,  while  absolutely  barren, 
was  nevertheless  impressibly  full  of  emptiness.  At  the  back 
part  was  a  large  pine  table.     On  this  table  were  a  few  law 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER  501 

books,  scattered  in  appropriate  disorder.  Towards  the  end 
of  the  table,  uncommonly  tall,  stood  a  giant  man  intently 
reading  a  law  book,  impressing  the  spectator  with  the  idea  that 
the  man  was  either  too  tall  for  the  room  or  that  the  ceiling 
was  too  low  for  the  man.  The  book  he  was  reading  was 
slightly  inclined  so  as  to  catch  the  faint  rays  of  light  on  the 
pages  from  a  rear  window.  The  shade  and  background  of 
the  whole  with  the  somber  hue  of  the  reader,  made  a  very 
dark  picture,  and  the  man  stood  like  a  silhouette,  excepting  a 
momentary  flash  of  the  eye  which  he  gave  to  the  intruder  and 
then  continued  his  reading.  That  glance  of  the  eye  was  the 
only  recognition  or  sign  of  life." 

Mr.  Arnold*  describes  the  man  thus : 

"Lincoln  was  ...  six  feet,  four  inches  in  height  and  would 
be  instantly  recognized  as  belonging  to  that  type  of  tall,  large- 
boned  men,  produced  in  the  Northern  part  of  the  Mississippi 
Valley,  and  exhibiting  its  peculiar  characteristics  in  the  most 
marked  degree  in  Tennessee,  Kentucky,  and  Illinois.  In  any 
Court-Room  in  the  United  States  he  would  instantly  have  been 
picked  out  as  a  Western  man.  His  stature,  figure,  dress,  man- 
ner, voice,  and  accent,  indicated  that  he  was  of  the  North-West. 
In  manner  he  was  always  cordial  and  frank,  and,  although  not 
without  dignity,  he  made  every  person  feel  quite  at  his  ease. 
I  think  the  first  impression  a  stranger  would  get  of  him, 
whether  in  conversation,  or  by  hearing  him  speak,  was,  that 
this  is  a  kind,  frank,  sincere,  genuine  man ;  of  transparent 
truthfulness  and  integrity:  and  before  Lincoln  had  uttered 
many  words,  he  would  be  impressed  with  his  clear  good  sense, 
his  remarkably  simple,  homely,  wit  and  humor." 


*Isaac  N.  Arnold,  "Reminiscences  of  the  Illinois  Bar,  Forty  Years 
Ago,"  in  Fergus'  Historical  Series,  Vol.  2,  No.  14,  p.  I45>  (Chicago,  1881). 


502  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER 

Mr.  S.  Wesley  Martin,  afterward  of  California,  has  de- 
scribed Lincoln's  manner  and  looks : 

"He  was  a  convincing  speaker.  He  used  no  gestures,  ex- 
cept that  occasionally  he  would  extend  his  long  right  arm  and 
point  with  his  index  finger  at  the  people  in  a  way  that  seemed 
to  say,  'Don't  you  see?' 

"I  shall  never  forget  how  Lincoln  was  dressed.  His  coat 
was  of  black  glossy  alpaca.  It  seemed  to  be  several  inches 
too  short  for  him,  and  he  buttoned  the  lowest  button  so  that 
the  upper  part  of  the  coat  spread  outward  as  if  to  make  room 
for  something  to  be  tucked  in  at  the  sides.  The  hat  was  a  tall 
stove  pipe  and  had  evidently  seen  better  days.  It  looked  as  if 
a  calf  might  have  gone  over  it  with  its  wet  tongue." 

When  he  appeared  on  the  platform  or  in  the  parlor  he 
showed  his  respect  for  his  audience  or  his  associates  by 
dressing  properly  and  in  a  way  that  would  have  been  wholly 
incompatible  with  the  dust  or  mire  of  the  prairie  roads. 

Lincoln's  reputation  as  a  lawyer  was  made  between  1840 
and  1854.  From  traveling  the  Eighth  Circuit  and  the  counties 
adjoining  he  extended  his  practice  into  every  part  of  the  state, 
until,  with  the  added  fame  which  his  debates  with  Douglas  in 
1858  brought  him,  there  were  many  points  in  Illinois  where 
in  every  important  case  it  was  considered  necessary  to  en- 
gage the  services  of  Mr.  Lincoln.  One  cannot  overestimate  the 
value  of  this  hard  life  on  the  circuit  both  as  discipline  develop- 
ing the  man's  powers  and  as  an  avenue  toward  that  extraor- 
dinary personal  acquaintance  which  meant  so  much  to  him  in 
his  political  struggles  later  on. 

The  supreme  court  was  in  session  only  a  few  days  in  the 
year,  and  the  circuit  court  at  Springfield  sat  for  only  a  few 
weeks.  The  rest  of  the  year  he  "rode  the  circuit"  by  stage 
and  on  horseback  until  he  could  afford  a  buggy,  visiting  each 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER  503 

of   the   fourteen   towns   regularly  and   extending   his   journey 
to  almost  as  many  adjoining  towns. 

The  life  on  the  road,  hard  as  it  was,  with  judge,  lawyers, 
witnesses,  hangers-on,  and  even  prisoners,  traveling  together 
and  eating  and  sleeping  together,  the  food  unspeakable,  and 
rest  unknown,  must,  nevertheless,  have  had  its  compensating 
joys.  That  was  no  ordinary  company.  It  was  not  unlike  the 
pilgrimage  to  Canterbury.  There  was  David  Davis,  the  com- 
panionable judge,  who  knew  the  law,  and  who  loved  a  laugh. 
And  there  were  Logan  the  scholarly,  and  Stuart,  the  shrewd 
and  kindly,  Swett,  the  clever,  and  Browning,  the  handsome, 
and  Lamon,  the  amusing,  and  Weldon,  and  Gridley,  and  Parks, 
and  Harmon,  and  Ficklin,  and  Linder,  and  Whitney,  and  Oliver 
L.  Davis,  and  the  best  beloved  Abraham  Lincoln.  Some  of 
them  traveled  to  only  two  or  three  counties,  but  David  Davis 
and  Lincoln  went  the  whole  circuit,  Davis  because  he  had  to, 
and  Lincoln  because  he  loved  it. 

"I  well  recollect,"  says  Mr.  Whitney,  in  his  Life  of  Lin- 
coln, "a  term  of  court  at  Urbana,  where  a  prisoner  on  trial  for 
perjury  used  to  spend  his  evenings  with  us  in  the  judge's 
room,  and  a  term  at  Danville  where  a  prisoner  on  trial  for 
larceny  not  only  spent  his  evenings  in  our  room,  but  had  his 
meals  with  us  and  took  walks  in  our  immediate  company." 

The  courts  in  the  fourteen  counties  commenced  in  Septem- 
ber, and  continued  until  midsummer,  sitting  in  each  town 
from  two  days  to  a  week. 

Leonard  Swett  says :  "I  rode  the  Eighth  Judicial  Circuit 
with  Lincoln  for  eleven  years,  and  in  the  allotment  between 
him  and  the  large  Judge  Davis  in  the  scanty  provision  of 
these  times,  as  a  rule  I  slept  with  him.  Beds  were  always  too 
short,  coffee  in  the  morning  burned  or  otherwise  bad,  food 
often  indifferent,  roads  simply  trails,  streams  without  bridges 


504  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,   LAWYER 

and  often  swollen,  and  had  to  be  swam,  sloughs  often  muddy 
and  almost  impassable,  and  we  had  to  help  the  horses  when 
the  wagon  mired  down,  with  fence  rails  for  pries." 

Naturally  the  business  of  a  court  that  sat  for  only  a  few 
days  and  then  adjourned  for  six  months  had  to  be  crowded 
through  in  such  a  way  as  to  afford  scant  opportunity  for  prep- 
aration. Thus  the  rule  of  the  Macon  Circuit  Court  (1840) 
reads :  "All  issues  are  required  to  be  made  up  on  call  of  the 
cause  for  trial." 

Judge  Davis  had  little  patience  with  technicalities.  "  'It 
appears  to  me/  Swett  once  commenced,  in  an  argument  on 
demurrer.  'I  don't  care  how  it  appears  to  you/  was  the 
judge's  tart  response.  'Hand  up  your  authorities  if  you  have 
any.' " 

The  lawyers  were  wont  to  follow  the  court  from  county 
to  county,  often  without  employment  except  what  they  picked 
up  on  arrival.  Sometimes  the  harvest  of  cases  would  not  pay 
the  cost  of  the  journey,  and,  again,  after  a  lawyer's  reputation 
as  a  case  winner  had  become  established,  the  business  would 
be  all  that  could  be  desired. 

The  trip  to  Tazewell  county,  seventy  miles,  as  shown  by 
the  docket,  cost  $21.25.  To  extend  it  to  Decatur  and  Dan- 
ville and  Paris  made  the  expense  one  which  a  less  successful 
lawyer  could  not  have  afforded.  The  business  that  came  to 
Lincoln  on  such  a  trip  must  sometimes  have  been  dishearten- 
ing. His  first  case  at  Decatur  is  People  v.  Adkin,  in  which 
the  defendant,  charged  with  larceny,  having  pleaded  his  in- 
ability to  employ  counsel,  Judge  Treat  appointed  Lincoln  to 
defend.  The  trial,  with  Lincoln's  kinsman,  Hanks,  on  the 
jury,  resulted  in  an  acquittal.  The  only  case  at  one  term  at 
Danville  was  Murphenheim  vs.  Scott,  (1850),  where  the  jury 
disagreed  and  the  parties  re-submitted  the  case  and  by  agree- 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,   LAWYER  505 

ment  suffered  a  verdict  to  be  entered  for  seven  dollars  and  a 
half,  each  party  to  pay  half  the  costs — a  commendable  com- 
promise, no  doubt,  and  yet  a  meager  feast  to  set  before  a 
lawyer  who  had  traveled  over  a  hundred  miles  on  horseback. 
At  the  Fall  term,  1852,  at  Danville,  Lincoln's  entire  calendar 
consisted  of  three  little  cases.  At  Paris,  the  next  week,  his 
appearance  is  noted  in  nineteen  different  suits,  which,  for  a 
term  of  five  days,  held  one  hundred  and  fifty  miles  from 
home,  is  no  mean  showing. 

One  feature  of  Judge  Davis'  itinerant  court  was  his  "night 
sessions."  The  lawyers,  attracted  to  the  town  by  the  advent 
of  the  court,  would  find  time  hanging  heavy  on  their  hands 
and,  at  the  afternoon  adjournment,  would  be  notified  to  return 
after  supper.  This  would  bring  together  the  best  of  the 
story-tellers  and  the  most  entertaining  of  the  talkers.  Some- 
times, to  keep  up  the  form  of  court  proceedings  and  thus 
justify  the  called-session  a  mock  trial  would  be  had  which 
would  give  the  lawyers  an  opportunity  for  the  once  popular 
practical  joke.  It  was  at  one  of  these  sessions,  known  as  the 
"orgmathorical  court,"  that  Judge  Oliver  Davis  tried  Abra- 
ham Lincoln,  on  the  criminal  side  of  the  court,  for  impoverish- 
ing the  bar  by  charging  unreasonably  low  fees  and  by  defend- 
ing poor  clients  without  pay.  Lincoln  was  released  with  a 
severe  reprimand  and  a  suspended  sentence. 

"At  these  meetings,"  says  "Uncle"  Felix  Ryan,  of  Lincoln, 
Illinois,  "The  lawyers  would  come  to  the  court  room  and  have 
fun  together  until  the  night  was  nearly  gone.  Many  of  the 
stories  would  be  told  by  Mr.  Lincoln.  Judge  Davis  would  sit 
there  and  pretend  to  read  his  docket  until  Lincoln  would  get 
him  interested.  I  recall  how  Judge  Davis'  fat  sides  would 
shake  with  laughter  as  he  said :  'Well,  well,  Mr.  Lincoln, 
what  next  ?'  " 


506  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER 

Squire  J.  T.  Rudolph,  of  Lincoln,  remembers  when  Judge 
Davis  would  call  them  all  together  as  if  to  try  cases,  and  the 
people  of  the  town  (Mt.  Pulaski)  would  crowd  in  to  enjoy  an 
evening's  entertainment  as  provided  by  the  lawyers.  Ward  H. 
Lamon,  (sometimes  Lincoln's  associate  in  the  practice  at 
Danville)  was  a  good  singer  and  would  mount  the  big  walnut 
table  and  sing  and  dance  to  the  delight  of  everyone. 

When  the  night  sessions  were  not  held,  the  bar  would 
gather  at  the  tavern,  and,  doubtless,  to  forget  the  misery  of 
crowded  beds  and  unspeakable  meals,  would  keep  the  talk 
going  all  night  long. 

One  of  these  taverns  advertised,  "Entertainment  for  Man 
and  Beast,"  and  like  many  of  the  rest  discriminated  in  favor 
of  the  beast.  Here  decent  and  vulgar  men  mingled  in  admired 
confusion.  Money  was  won  and  lost  at  cards,  and  stories 
hopelessly  coarse  had  no  less  currency  than  those  did  whose 
wit  and  humor  have  made  them  immortal.  To  the  promiscu- 
ous character  of  these  gatherings  is  due  no  doubt  the  fact  that 
over  a  half  century  later  many  stories  are  attributed  to  the 
civilized  men  of  the  company  which  never  reached  their  ears. 

It  was  during  this  period  that  an  incident  occurred  of 
which  Judge  Blodgett,  for  many  years  United  States  Judge,  is 
said  to  have  told.  It  had  rained  for  days,  and  when  the  com- 
pany of  circuit  riders  came  to  a  swollen  stream,  apparently 
miles  wide,  Lincoln  was  the  only  one  who  knew  the  country 
well  enough  to  act  as  guide.  He  saw  his  opportunity  and 
agreed  to  conduct  the  party  across  if  they  would  do  exactly 
as  he  bade  them.  It  was  the  boys'  game  of  "follow  my  leader." 
The  pledge  was  given  and  every  lawyer  had  to  strip,  tie  his 
clothes  in  a  bundle,  mount  his  horse,  and  follow  on.  This 
grotesque,  naked  company,  including  the  cherubic  figure  of 
David  Davis,  and  the  giant  form  of  Abraham  Lincoln,  wound 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER  507 

its  way  up  and  down  the  stream  on  horseback,  until,  much  as 
Moses  led  the  hosts  of  Israel  through  the  Red  Sea  without 
wetting  a  garment,  Lincoln  conducted  them  to  dry  ground  on 
the  farther  side  of  what  they  supposed  was  a  flood,  but  which 
at  no  time  rose  higher  than  a  horse's  knees.  One  can  imagine 
Lincoln's  laugh  at  the  threats  of  revenge  which  his  associates 
uttered  when  they  found  what  an  absurd  picture  they  had 
presented. 

In  many  of  these  towns  a  few  old  men  still  live  who  tell 
with  undiminished  enthusiasm  their  recollections  of  that  far 
off  time.  Some  of  the  communities  are  not  unlike  what 
they  were  seventy  years  ago.  Petersburg  is  still  the  home  of 
the  Rutledges,  Greens,  Clarys,  and  Armstrongs.  And  all 
over  the  circuit  it  was  still  possible  in  recent  years  to  learn 
from  men  who  knew  Mr.  Lincoln  of  incidents  in  his  practice 
as  yet  unpublished. 

"He  was  a  very  smart  trial  lawyer,"  Judge  Lyman  Lacey, 
of  Havana,  relates.  "As  he  went  along  in  easy  fashion  he  ad- 
mitted evidence  offered  by  his  opponents  and  conceded  their 
points  until  it  looked  as  if  he  had  given  his  whole  case  away. 
'I  don't  contest  this  point,'  Lincoln  would  say.  'O !  I'll  freely 
admit  that.'  But  all  the  time  there  would  be  one  or  more  strong 
lines  of  defense  left,  and,  after  waving  aside  all  that  he  had 
yielded,  he  would  conclude :  'But  here,  gentlemen,  is  the  real 
point  in  this  case,  and  on  it  we  rest  our  defense.'  ' 

Judge  Samuel  C.  Parke  has  noted  this  characteristic.  He 
says :  "In  a  closely  contested  case,  in  which  he  was  assisting 
me,  in  his  closing  speech,  he  was  extremely  liberal  in  his  ad- 
missions in  favor  of  the  defendant.  We  got  a  verdict  for 
about  two-thirds  of  our  claim.  I  said  to  him:  'Lincoln,  you 
admitted  too  much.'  'No,'  he  answered,  That's  what  gained 
the  case.'  " 


508  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,   LAWYER 

It  is  not  easy  to  take  a  series  of  pleadings  and  the  skeleton 
of  an  argument  as  we  find  them  sixty  years  after  and  get 
from  them  any  picture  of  the  comedy  or  tragedy  which  was 
enacted  when  such  a  case  was  tried.  Much  must  be  left  to 
the  imagination.  But  to  the  imagination  these  old  records 
sometimes  suggest  what  may  have  happened.  There  is  a  case 
on  the  docket  of  Edgar  County  for  1850  entitled  Albin  v. 
Bodine,  for  slander.  The  record  entries  are:  "Lincoln  and 
Linder  for  defendant.  Trial  by  jury.  Verdict  for  defendant." 
But  in  the  files  is  a  faded  sheet  of  legal  cap  in  Lincoln's  hand, 
entitled  "Brief"  which  sets  out  the  synopsis  of  points  for  the 
argument  to  the  jury.  And  every  point  seems  to  be  for  the 
other  side.  This  brief  is  a  rare  document,  for  its  author  had 
a  tenacious  memory  and  seldom  used  notes.  Let  us  read  some 
of  these  points: 

"1st.  Albin  stole  B  lady's  horse  out  of  my  pasture  last 
night.    He  is  a  horse  thief  and  that  is  what  he  came  here  for. 

"6th.  'You  know  you  stole  that  horse  and  it  is  not  the 
first  horse  you  have  stolen ;  and  I  believe  you  follow  the  busi- 
ness.' 

"9th.  'He  is  a  damned  little  horse  thief  and  his  business 
is  horse  stealing,  and  he  came  here  for  that  business  and  that 
is  not  the  first  horse  he  has  stolen.  He  is  a  horse  thief  and 
I  will  send  him  to  the  penitentiary.' 

"James  Murphy.  Dr.  Albin  stole  the  Priest's  horse  out  of 
my  pasture. 

"Crimen  falsi." 

One  theory  of  the  defense  is  that  the  defendant  said  all  that 
he  is  charged  with  saying — "damned  horse  thief"  and  all — 
and  that  his  counsel  in  one  of  his  scathing  philippics  held  the 
plaintiff  up  to  deserved  contempt,  or  by  a  series  of  brilliant 
sallies  of  wit  laughed  the  plaintiff  out  of  court.     The  other 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,   LAWYER  509 

is  suggested  by  the  two  Latin  words  Crimen  falsi  at  the  end 
and  hints  at  an  argument  charging  perjury.  And  yet  all  that 
the  record  shows  is  the  use  of  language  of  the  most  slanderous 
sort  and  a  verdict  for  the  defense. 

"I  have  sat  on  the  jury  in  his  cases/'  Mr.  Ryan,  of  Lincoln, 
Illinois,  said  to  me :  "He  knew  nearly  every  juror,  and  when 
he  made  his  speech  he  talked  to  the  jurors,  one  at  a  time,  like 
an  old  friend  who  wanted  to  reason  it  out  with  them  and  make 
it  as  easy  as  possible  for  them  to  find  the  truth." 

"He  never  talked  long,"  said  Mr.  John  Strong  of  Atlanta, 
Illinois,  "In  stating  a  disputed  proposition  he  would  say,  not, 
'This  is  the  way  it  is/  but  'This  is  the  way  it  seems  to  me/ 
thus  allowing  for  an  honest  difference  of  opinion." 

Judge  S.  A.  Foley,  of  Lincoln,  Illinois,  in  an  intimate  ac- 
count of  Lincoln,  displayed  a  clear  memory  of  his  court-room 
manner.  "When  Lincoln  examined  a  witness  or  addressed  a 
jury,  he  had  a  peculiarly  winning  way  of  doing  it.  In  an  open- 
ing statement  he  seemed  to  take  everybody  into  his  confidence 
as  though  he  proposed  to  keep  nothing  from  them.  In  cross- 
examination  he  would  first  secure  the  witness'  good  will  and 
then  lead  him  gently  along  until  he  elicited  from  him  the  truth 
for  which  he  was  seeking.  When  he  came  to  the  argument  he 
had  something  to  say  to  each  juror,  and  he  led  each  one  to 
believe  that,  as  attorney,  his  only  duty  was  to  help  the  jury 
find  the  truth.  Sometimes  he  made  his  point  so  plain  with  a 
story  that  there  was  no  escaping  his  conclusion." 

Because  he  reasoned  his  cases  out  it  is  not  to  be  supposed 
that  he  lacked  the  graces  of  oratory.  With  the  little  audience 
in  the  jury  box  he  began  by  feeling  his  way,  studying  the  man 
addressed,  and  talking  rather  than  speaking,  until  he  felt 
sure  that  he  was  in  complete  accord  with  the  men  to  whose 
judgment  he  was  making  his  appeal.     He  was  first  of  all  a 


510  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER 

reasoner.  But  he  was,  too,  a  man  of  wide  sympathy  and  deep 
feeling  and,  once  aroused,  he  was  brilliant  in  ridicule,  savage 
in  assault,  overwhelming  in  his  emotional  attack.  It  was  the 
oratory  of  the  forum,  not  the  oratory  of  the  platform  or  the 
stage. 

Judge  S.  C.  Parks  had  a  large  practice  while  Lincoln  was 
riding  the  circuit.  In  a  lecture  before  the  University  of 
Michigan  he  said: 

"He  was  a  great  advocate  and  more  successful  at  the  bar 
than  many  men  who  knew  more  law  than  himself.  .  .  .  For 
this  there  were  two  reasons.  One  was  that  he  was  naturally 
fair  minded,  and,  as  a  rule,  would  not  advocate  any  cause 
which  he  did  not  believe  to  be  just.  Owing  to  this  character- 
istic he  would  not  knowingly  take  a  case  that  was  wrong,  and 
if  he  ignorantly  got  into  such  a  case  he  would  generally  refuse 
to  prosecute  or  defend  it  after  he  had  ascertained  his  mistake. 
He  was  intellectually  honest.  He  would  not  advocate  a  cause 
in  which  he  did  not  believe.  He  was  the  easiest  lawyer  to 
beat  when  he  thought  he  was  wrong  that  I  ever  knew.  Soon 
after  beginning  to  practice,  I  was  employed  to  defend  a  man 
charged  with  larceny  and  Mr.  Lincoln  was  employed  to  assist 
me.  I  really  believed  at  the  beginning  of  the  trial  that  the 
man  was  not  guilty.  But  the  evidence  was  unfavorable,  and 
at  its  close  Mr.  Lincoln  called  me  into  the  consultation  room 
and  said:  'If  you  can  say  anything  that  will  do  our  man  any 
good,  say  it.  I  can't.  If  I  say  anything  the  jury  will  see  that 
I  think  he  is  guilty  and  will  convict  him.'  And  so  I  proposed 
to  the  prosecutor  to  submit  the  case  without  argument.  This 
was  done.  The  jury  disagreed,  and  before  the  case  could  be 
tried  again  the  man  died. 

"In  the  same  county  Lincoln  brought  suit  on  an  account 
and  proved  it  without  any  trouble.     Defendant's  attorney  then 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER  511 

produced  a  receipt  in  full  from  the  plaintiff  which  clearly  cov- 
ered the  account.  Lincoln  took  the  receipt,  examined  it  till 
he  was  satisfied,  and  handed  it  back  to  the  opposing  attorney 
who  proceeded  to  prove  it ;  whereupon  the  presiding  Judge 
(Treat)  inquired:  'What  do  you  say  to  that,  Mr.  Lincoln?' 
But  Lincoln  had  quietly  left  the  court  house  and  gone  to  his 
hotel.  The  court  sent  for  him,  but  he  declined  to  return,  say- 
ing to  the  sheriff :  Tell  Judge  Treat  that  my  hands  are  dirty 
and  I  want  to  wash  them.'  Owing  to  this  habit  of  not  advo- 
cating a  bad  case  he  had  the  advantage  of  feeling  that  he  ought 
to  gain  the  cases  that  he  did  advocate.  He  also  had  the  advan- 
tage of  having  the  confidence  of  the  court  and  jury  at  the  out- 
set and  the  fairness  and  skill  to  keep  it  to  the  close." 

The  leader  of  this  itinerant  bar,  without  whose  presence  no 
gathering  of  men  was  complete,  was  not  always  to  be  found. 
He  had  a  way  of  going  off  after  the  companionship  of  chil- 
dren. One  of  these  old-time  little  boys  described  to  me  the 
serious  way  in  which  Mr.  Lincoln  would  call  for  their  opinion 
on  political  questions,  and  interrogate  them  regarding  their 
personal  hopes  and  ambitions,  and  advise  with  them  as  if  he 
considered  them  to  be  men  of  mature  judgment.  He  was  par- 
ticularly given  to  trying  to  find  what  impression  the  young 
fellows  had  of  his  arguments  and  those  of  Douglas,  seemingly 
bearing  in  mind  the  ideal  of  his  own  youth  that  he  must  make 
his  meaning  so  plain  that  any  boy  he  knew  could  comprehend. 
Another  of  these  boys  has  told  of  the  delicious  way  in  which 
he  talked  foolishness  to  them  as  he  joined  in  their  games  of 
marbles  or  hand  ball. 

Mr.  George  S.  Cole,  of  Danville,  used  to  describe  his  first 
game  of  billiards :  "Mr.  Lincoln  called  me  in  to  see  the  first 
billiard  table  set  up  in  the  town  and  said :  'Come  on,  Bub, 
let's  play  a  game.'  My  awkwardness  with  the  cue  seemed 
to  please  him  hugely." 


512  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER 

"Nothing  tickled  him  so  much/'  said  Uncle  Felix  Ryan, 
"as  to  get  a  prank  on  the  boys.  Once  they  stretched  a  rope 
across  the  walk,  just  high  enough  to  catch  his  plug  hat.  He 
pretended  to  be  very  angry  and  ran  all  over  the  place  until  he 
had  caught  the  boys,  making  them  think  he  was  going  to  pun- 
ish them,  and  then  took  them  into  the  store  and  stood  treat." 

Sometimes  the  semi-annual  session  of  court  was  the  oc- 
casion of  social  activity  of  a  more  formal  character.  A  re- 
ception or  ball  would  draw  the  gentlemen  of  the  bar  away 
from  court  room  and  tavern  and  into  real  society.  Gentlewom- 
en living  sixty  years  after  and  still  young  in  spirit,  have  re- 
called those  occasions.  They  tell  how  Mr.  Lincoln,  seemingly 
careless  of  his  appearance  in  the  street  and  in  court,  was  yet 
in  society  "a  gentleman  of  the  old  school,"  who  arose  at  once 
when  a  lady  entered  the  room,  and  whose  courtly  manners 
would  put  to  shame  the  easy-going  indifference  to  etiquette 
which  marks  the  twentieth  century  gentleman.  One  of  them, 
who  must  has  been  a  belle  in  the  Fifties,  told  me  how  many 
a  pretty  girl  would  lead  her  escort  from  the  dance  to  the  card 
room  because  she  wanted  to  listen  to  Mr.  Lincoln's  talk. 

Says  Mr.  Arnold  :*  "I  must  not  omit  to  mention  the  old- 
fashioned,  generous  hospitality  of  Springfield — hospitality  pro- 
verbial to  this  day  throughout  the  state.  Among  others,  I 
recall,  with  the  sad  pleasure,  the  dinners  and  evening  parties, 
given  by  Mrs.  Lincoln.  In  her  modest  and  simple  home  .  .  . 
there  was  always,  on  the  part  of  both  host  and  hostess,  a  cordial 
and  hearty  Western  welcome,  which  put  every  guest  perfectly 
at  ease.  Mrs.  Lincoln's  table  was  famed  for  the  excellence  of 
many  rare  Kentucky  dishes,  and  in  season,  it  was  loaded  with 


*Isaac  N.  Arnold,  "Reminiscences  of  the  Illinois  Bar  Forty  Years 
Ago";  in  Fergus'  Historical  Series,  Vol.  2,  No.  14,  p.137-38  (Chicago, 
1881). 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER  513 

venison,  wild  turkeys,  prairie  chicken,  quail,  and  other  game 
which  was  then  abundant.  Yet  it  was  her  genial  manners  and 
ever  kind  welcome,  and  Mr.  Lincoln's  wit  and  humor,  anecdote, 
and  unrivaled  conversation,  which  formed  the  chief  attraction." 

The  court  room  was  not  the  only  place  where  the  lawyers 
made  themselves  useful.  At  Decatur,  when  the  first  piano 
was  brought  by  wagon  across  the  prairie,  the  adjournment  of 
court,  so  Mrs.  Jane  Johns  relates,  furnished  an  anxious  young 
lady  with  the  skilled  labor  required  to  unload  the  big,  delicate 
instrument.  It  was  Mr.  Lincoln  who  superintended  the  re- 
moval and  his  strong  arms  that  lifted  one  end  of  the  piano 
while  a  half  dozen  other  brawny  circuit  riders  handled  the 
other  end. 

It  was  at  this  period  that  Lincoln  wrote  to  his  friend  Speed : 
"I  am  so  poor  and  make  so  little  headway  in  the  world  that 
I  drop  back  in  a  month  of  idleness  as  much  as  I  gain  in  a 
year's  sowing." 

That  was  no  day  for  specialists.  The  collection  lawyer  of 
seventy  years  ago  won  insubstantial  rewards,  although  he  did 
not  hesitate  to  advertise  for  business.  Even  David  Davis, 
soon  to  enter  upon  a  long  and  brilliant  judicial  career,  adver- 
tised in  1837  in  the  Sangamo  Journal:  "Notes  and  accounts 
entrusted  to  him  for  collection  will  meet  with  a  most  prompt 
attention."  And  Lincoln,  in  collecting  six  hundred  dollars 
from  Stephen  A.  Douglas  under  circumstances  embarrassing 
to  both,  set  the  "minimum  fee"  precedent  by  charging  three 
dollars  and  a  half  for  the  service. 

A  New  York  firm  applied  to  Abraham  Lincoln  for  a  report 
on  the  financial  condition  of  a  neighbor.  Mr.  Lincoln  replied 
as  follows :  "Yours  of  the  10th  inst.  received.  I  am  well  ac- 
quainted with  Mr. and  know  his  circumstances. 

First  of  all  he  has  a  wife  and  baby ;  together,  they  ought  to 


514  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER 

be  worth  $50,000  to  any  man.  Secondly,  he  has  an  office  in 
which  there  is  a  table  worth  $1.50  and  three  chairs  worth,  say 
$1.  Last  of  all  there  is  in  one  corner  a  large  rat-hole,  which 
will  bear  looking  into. 

Respectfully  yours, 

A.  Lincoln/' 

There  are  in  circulation  many  authentic  stories  that  were 
used  by  Lincoln  to  enforce  an  argument  at  law.  But  they 
have  all  been  published  long  ago,  along  with  many  that  are 
not  authentic.  Two  of  these  are  no  doubt  familiar,  but  they 
will  serve  to  show  Lincoln's  method.  They  are  reported  by 
Miss  Tarbell  in  her  Life  of  Lincoln  and  by  Mr.  Hill  in  his 
Lincoln  the  Lawyer. 

One  of  these  is  attributed  to  the  late  Judge  Beckwith,  of 
Danville.  Lincoln  was  trying  to  make  plain  to  the  jury  the 
legal  effect  of  self-defense.  "My  client,"  he  explained,  "was 
in  the  fix  of  a  man  who  was  carrying  a  pitchfork  along  the 
country  road  when  he  was  suddenly  attacked  by  a  vicious  dog. 
In  the  trouble  that  followed  the  prongs  of  the  pitchfork  killed 
the  dog.  'What  made  you  kill  my  dog?'  the  farmer  cried  in 
rage.  'What  made  him  try  to  bite  me?'  'But  why  didn't  you 
go  at  him  with  the  other  end  of  the  pitchfork?'  'Why  didn't 
he  come  at  me  with  the  other  end  of  the  dog?'  The  jury  saw 
what  self-defense  meant. 

Mr.  T.  W.  S.  Kidd,  for  many  years  court  crier  at  Spring- 
field, says  he  once  heard  a  lawyer  arguing  to  the  jury  the  con- 
trolling authority  of  precedent.  When  Lincoln's  turn  came 
to  answer  he  took  up  the  argument  from  precedent  in  this  way : 
"Old  Squire  Bagley  from  Menard  came  into  my  office  once 
and  said:  'Lincoln,  I  want  your  advice  as  a  lawyer.  Has  a 
man  that's  been  elected  a  justice  of  the  peace  a  right  to  issue 
a  marriage  license?'     I  told  him  No,  and  he  threw  himself 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER  515 

back  indignantly  in  his  chair  and  said,  'Lincoln,  I  thought  you 
was  a  lawyer.  Bob  Thomas  and  1  had  a  bet  on  this  thing, 
and  we  agreed  to  leave  it  to  you,  but  if  this  is  your  opinion  I 
don't  want  it,  for  I  know  a  thunderin'  sight  better.  I've  been 
a  Squire  now  eight  years  and  I  have  done  it  all  the  time.'  " 

He  once  characterized  an  ultra-technical  judge  by  saying 
"He  would  hang  a  man  for  blowing  his  nose  in  the  street,  but 
he  would  quash  the  indictment  if  it  failed  to  state  which  hand 
he  did  it  with." 

Justice  Brewer,  of  the  United  States  Supreme  Court,  has 
given  us  this  story  of  Lincoln's  sincerity : 

Lincoln  was  defending  a  murder  case.  The  act  was  so 
brutal,  and  the  circumstantial  evidence  so  complete  that  even 
Lincoln  himself,  after  a  most  careful  investigation,  conceded 
that  everything  seemed  to  point  to  his  client's  guilt.  He  had 
thought  a  great  deal  on  the  case,  he  told  the  men  in  the  jury 
box,  and  while  it  seemed  probable  that  his  client  was  guilty 
yet  he  was  not  sure.  With  those  honest  eyes  of  his  he  looked 
the  jury  in  the  face  and  said,  "I  am  not  sure.  Are  you?"  It 
was  an  application  of  the  rule  of  reasonable  doubt  which  se- 
cured an  acquittal. 

A  Kansas  lawyer  wrote  some  years  ago:  "My  name  orig- 
inally was  Patrick  William  Hackney,  and  I  went  by  the  name 
of  Patrick  or  Tat'  until  we  moved  back  to  Illinois,  where 
they  changed  it  to  William  Patrick  Hackney.  My  father,  in 
1850,  and  I  met  Mr.  Lincoln  on  the  street  as  he  was  returning 
from  the  Court  House  at  the  dinner  hour — the  first  time  they 
had  met  since  father  went  to  Iowa.  They  greeted  each  other 
very  cordially  indeed;  father  called  him  'Abe'  and  he  called 
father  'Jake/  father's  name  being  Jacob.  Father  introduced 
me  to  him  as  his  son  Tat.'  He  was  very  tall  and  very  slim. 
I  remember  that  I  thought  he  was  the  homeliest  man  that  I 


516  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER 

had  ever  seen.  In  the  course  of  the  conversation,  after  inquir- 
ing about  each  other,  he  said  to  father,  'I  presume  you  know, 
Jake,  I  am  a  lawyer  now.'  Father  said,  'Yes,  I  have  heard 
of  it.'  He  says:  'I  am  going  to  make  a  speech  after  dinner 
to  a  jury,  and  I  wish  you  would  come  up  and  bring  Pat  with 
you.'    Father  told  him  he  would. 

"Father  and  I  went  to  the  Court  House — it  was  the  first 
time  that  I  had  ever  been  in  a  Court  House — and  took  our 
seats.  Mr.  Lincoln  was  there  when  we  arrived,  but  the  Court 
had  not  yet  opened.  Judge  Davis,  of  Illinois,  was  the  Judge. 
I  do  not  remember  the  name  of  the  prosecutor.  He  was  a 
small  man  in  stature,  and  as  I  remember,  rather  heavier  than 
slim,  with  long,  wavy,  black  hair,  and  it  seemed  to  me,  with  a 
wonderful  vocabulary. 

"The  case  was  one  in  which  two  carpenters  in  a  shop  got 
into  a  dispute ;  one  a  little  fellow,  and  the  other  a  large  man. 
It  ended  in  a  fight,  in  which  the  big  fellow  whipped  the  little 
one,  he  hollowed  'nough,'  and  the  big  fellow  got  off,  as 
was  the  custom  of  that  day,  from  the  little  one,  and  returned 
to  his  bench  to  work  with  his  back  to  where  the  little  man 
was  working  before  the  fight  commenced,  and  where  he  was 
at  the  end  of  the  fight.  He  got  up,  ran  to  his  bench,  grabbed 
a  big  file  with  no  handle — files  at  that  time  ran  out  to  a  sharp 
point;  I  have  seen  many  of  them  with  simply  a  corn  cob  for 
a  handle ; — he  grabbed  this  file  without  any  handle  on  it,  ran 
up  behind  the  big  fellow,  and  stabbed  him  in  the  back  with  it, 
and  as  I  recollect  now,  came  very  near  killing  him.  The  little 
fellow  was  being  prosecuted  for  that,  and  Lincoln  was  defend- 
ing him. 

"When  Lincoln  got  up  to  speak  he  was  wonderfully  tall,  I 
thought,  and  spare,  and  as  I  said,  very  homely,  but  it  wasn't 
but  a  little  bit  until  he  had  the  Judge,  who  was  a  very  large 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER  517 

man,  shaking  with  laughter,  as  were  the  jury  and  the  specta- 
tors, and  he  convinced  me  that  the  little  fellow  ought  not  to  be 
convicted,  but  what  he  said  to  convince  me,  I  don't  remember. 

"I  afterwards  went  to  Lincoln,  111.,  the  county  seat  having 
been  changed  from  Mt.  Pulaski  there,  to  hear  Mr.  Lincoln 
and  Douglas  speak,  in  1858.  Our  family  library  consisted  of 
the  Bible  and  the  New  York  Tribune,  which  was  a  newspaper 
more  than  any  of  our  neighbors  had,  and  while  I  was  a  boy, 
I  understood  at  that  time  the  controversy  over  which  the  dis- 
cussion arose  as  well  as  anybody,  and  a  great  deal  more  than 
nine  tenths  of  those  whom  I  knew  or  associated  with,  and  I 
went  down  there  to  hear  them.  The  arrangement  was  that 
Lincoln  should  speak  in  the  forenoon,  on  a  platform  fixed  in 
the  Court  House  yard — he  spoke  from  ten  to  twelve  o'clock. 
I  remember  it  as  one  of  the  marvelous  speeches  that  I  have 
ever  listened  to  in  my  life.  While  I  have  thought  that  Lincoln 
was  the  homeliest  man  that  I  ever  saw  in  repose,  I  believed  then 
and  I  believe  now,  that  he  was  the  handsomest  man  I  ever 
listened  to  make  a  speech,  when  he  warmed  up  to  his  subject. 
I  have  never  read  a  description  of  Lincoln  of  any  kind  that 
came  within  a  thousand  miles  of  describing  him  in  action.  He 
was  simply  grandeur  itself. 

"There  was  a  circus  in  town  that  day  from  one  till  three, 
and  it  was  arranged  for  Douglas  to  speak  in  the  tent  after 
the  show  .  .  .  and  I  went  for  the  purpose  of  securing  a  seat 
more  than  to  see  the  show,  because  I  was  more  interested  in 
these  two  speeches  than  I  was  to  see  the  show,  even  if  I  was 
a  boy,  and  I  had  seen  shows  before.  They  ran  a  menagerie 
wagon  out  into  the  ring  where  the  circus  had  been  held,  put  a 
ladder  up  to  it,  took  a  small  table  up  there,  two  chairs  and  two 
pitchers  and  a  glass,  and  it  was  said  that  there  was  a  quart  of 
whiskey  in   one  pitcher  and  a   quart   of   water   in   the   other. 


518  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER 

Whether  true  or  not,  I  don't  know,  but  it  was  accepted  as  a 
fact  at  that  time  and  I  never  heard  anybody  question  it.  It 
was  the  first  time  I  had  even  seen  Douglas.  He  and  the 
chairman  to  be  climbed  that  ladder  on  top  of  that  wagon ;  the 
tent  filled  up  until  there  was  standing  room  for  no  more,  and 
for  three  hours  Douglas  made  one  of  his  great  speeches,  and 
it  was  a  great  speech.  He  understood  the  art  of  appealing  to 
the  prejudices  of  his  audience,  and  could  do  it  successfully  in 
a  way  that  I  have  never  heard  any  other  man  do,  but  boy  as  I 
was,  knowing  what  I  did  on  the  questions  involved,  his  subter- 
fuges and  want  of  candor  were  so  marked  that  I  could  not 
help  but  notice  it.  The  difference  between  the  two  men  was 
so  great  that  anyone  with  a  discriminating  mind  would  be 
able  to  detect  the  difference.  Lincoln  was  open,  honest,  did 
not  play  to  the  galleries,  but  he  drove  the  truth  home  with  such 
power  and  force  that  there  was  no  way  of  escaping  it.  I  think 
that  Douglas  as  an  orator,  so  far  as  rhetorical  flourish  is  con- 
cerned, adroitness  and  capacity  to  change  quickly  his  position 
or  defend  an  untenable  one,  never  had  his  superior  in  my 
judgment,  but  he  never  was  a  match  for  Lincoln  one  moment." 
The  value  which  Lincoln  put  upon  simplicity  is  summed  up 
in  the  remark  he  made  to  Herndon :  "If  I  can  clear  this  case 
of  its  technicalities  and  get  it  properly  swung  to  the  jury,  I'll 
win  it."  From  this  it  is  by  no  means  to  be  inferred  that  he 
did  not  respect  the  requirements  of  the  practice,  or  make  use 
of  the  technical  points  in  a  case  where  occasion  required  it. 
He  was  a  practical,  well-trained  lawyer,  who  accepted  all  prop- 
er employments  and  gave  to  his  clients  the  benefit  of  his  extra- 
ordinary mental  and  legal  equipment.  In  his  early  struggles 
in  justice's  courts  his  discomfited  opponents  used  to  hint  at 
pettifogging,  and  in  his  supreme  court  arguments  he  was  will- 
ing to  win  on  questions  of  practice  and  what  careless  lawyers 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER  519 

call  technicalities.  Lawyers  know  that  a  neglect  to  take  such 
advantage  as  the  rules  of  the  practice  permit  is  a  breach  of  the 
duty  one  owes  to  a  client.  And  they  know,  too,  that  one  who 
"plays  the  game"  according  to  its  rules  may  yet  play  fairly 
and  honestly. 

The  traditions  of  Lincoln's  humor  in  the  trial  of  his  cases 
are  well  established.  In  his  early  practice  particularly  he  used 
his  gifts  as  a  raconteur  and  a  mimic  most  effectively  in  demon- 
strating his  points.  The  evidence  of  this  is  in  the  reminiscences 
of  his  colleagues  and  in  oral  tradition.  Old  men  of  middle 
Illinois  still  repeat  his  stories.  But  the  actual  court  record  of 
his  humor  is  very  slight.  I  only  know  of  two  illustrations. 
One  is  a  figure  probably  employed  by  him  in  presenting  a 
point  of  law  to  the  supreme  court  in  St.  Louis,  etc.,  Railway 
Company  against  Dalby,  19  111.,  353,  and  is  buried  in  the  mass 
of  a  profound  opinion  by  Judge  Caton  at  page  374.  It  was 
a  damage  case  brought  by  Lincoln  against  the  railway  com- 
pany for  assault  committed  in  ejecting  plaintiff  from  a  car. 
The  railway  company  contended  that  the  corporation  could 
not  be  liable  for  beating  because  it  had  no  body  to  be  beaten, 
and  the  court  disposed  of  the  question  with  this  proposition — 
no  doubt  advanced  by  Lincoln :  "As  well  might  it  be  said  that 
a  man  cannot  commit  a  rape  because  he  cannot  be  the  subject 
of  one."  The  other  is  a  bill  for  divorce,  the  original  of  which 
is  in  the  possession  of  Mr.  F.  R.  Fisher  of  Terre  Haute,  In- 
diana. At  that  time  no  one  had  any  good  will  for  the  negro. 
The  bill  is  drawn  in  a  jocular  vein,  referring  to  the  defendant, 
who  was  a  habitual  drunkard,  as  "a  gentleman  of  colour,"  and 
averring  that  the  couple  had  lived  together  for  many  years, 
"though  not  in  the  highest  state  of  connubial  felicity." 

Judge  Gustave  Koerner,  who  served  on  the  supreme  bench 
in  the  early  period  of  Lincoln's  practice,  recalls  in  his  Mem- 


520  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER 

oirs,  published  in  1909,  "the  often  quaint  and  droll  language 
used  by  him"  in  his  arguments  in  that  court. 

That  he  had  the  Bible  at  his  tongue's  end,  and,  knowing 
its  value  in  any  appeal  he  might  make  to  the  sympathy,  or  im- 
agination, or  reason  of  his  audience,  made  use  of  it  in  his  pub- 
lic utterances,  is  well  known.  That  he  made  the  same  use  of 
scripture  in  convincing  his  juries  is  a  matter  of  tradition.  To 
get  the  documentary  proof  of  this  has  not  been  so  easy.  But 
in  the  files  of  the  circuit  court  of  Menard  county  the  papers 
in  Page  v.  Boyd,  tried  in  1847,  afford  the  proof  that  his  use 
of  the  Bible  in  his  closing  speech  was  causing  his  opponent 
some  uneasiness.  It  was  a  damage  suit  against  Lincoln's 
client  for  injuries  suffered  by  two  mares  that  had  strayed  into 
the  defendant's  pasture  and  been  used  by  defendant  while  in 
his  custody.  In  the  files,  hurriedly  scrawled  on  a  scrap  of 
paper  by  plaintiff's  counsel,  Mr.  Robbins,  is  the  following: 

"Will  the  court  instruct  the  jury  that  the  passage  from 
Exodus  read  by  the  counsel  in  this  case  does  not  apply  in  this 
suit  as  law?" 

This  instruction  is  endorsed  "Given."  The  record  shows 
a  verdict  for  plaintiff. 

The  passage  referred  to  may  have  been  Exodus  XXII-13 ; 
XXIII-4. 

Any  lawyer  of  Lincoln's  ability  would  have  accumulated  a 
comfortable  fortune  with  such  a  practice.  When  he  left 
Springfield  in  1861  he  was  fifty-two  years  old  and  the  recog- 
nized leader  of  the  Illinois  bar.  And  yet,  though  living  far 
from  extravagantly,  his  entire  estate  was  barely  ten  thousand 
dollars. 

Mr.  John  W.  Bunn,  of  Springfield,  a  client  and  friend,  tells 
an  incident  which  fairly  illustrates  Lincoln's  idea  of  the  value 
of  his  own  services.     George  Smith  and   Company,   Chicago 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER  521 

bankers,  had  written  to  Mr.  Bunn  to  get  some  one  to  look 
after  their  defense  in  an  attachment  suit  involving  several  thou- 
sand dollars.  Lincoln  conducted  the  trial  and,  winning  it, 
charged  them  twenty-five  dollars.  They  wrote  back  to  Mr. 
Bunn:  "We  asked  you  to  get  the  best  lawyer  in  Springfield 
and  it  certainly  looks  as  if  you  had  secured  one  of  the  cheapest." 

For  defending  a  damage  suit  at  Paris  involving  three  thou- 
sand dollars,  Mr.  Andrew  J.  Hunter  says  the  fee  charged  Mr. 
Hunter's  father  by  Usher  F.  Linder  and  Abraham  Lincoln 
was  fifteen  dollars,  paid  in  wild  cat  currency. 

The  instances  of  his  volunteer  service,  as  in  defending 
"Duff"  Armstrong  for  murder,  for  friendship's  sake,  are  not 
rare.  When  he  had  finished  a  case  he  seemed  indifferent  to 
any  desire  for  adequate  compensation.  The  joy  of  the  contest 
had  been  his,  and  the  satisfaction  of  having  done  his  best.  As 
for  the  fees,  they  were  of  little  consequence. 

His  charge  in  the  defense  of  McCormick  v.  Manny,  a  case 
involving  some  of  the  McCormick  reaper  patents,  valued  at 
half  a  million  dollars,  was  two  thousand  dollars,  and  his  fee 
in  the  case  of  McLean  County  against  Illinois  Central  Rail- 
road Company  was  five  thousand  dollars.  His  average  yearly 
income  when  he  left  the  practice  is  said  to  have  been  about 
three  thousand  dollars. 

When  he  had  finished  his  senatorial  race  against  Stephen 
A  Douglas  and  paid  his  campaign  assessment  of  five  hundred 
dollars,  he  returned  to  take  up  the  practice,  which  had  become 
sadly  demoralized.  "It  is  bad  to  be  poor,"  he  wrote,  "I  shall 
go  to  the  wall  for  bread  and  meat  if  I  neglect  my  business  this 
year  as  well  as  last."  To  eke  out  his  income  he  prepared  a 
lecture  which  he  delivered  at  a  few  places.  But  as  a  Lyceum 
speaker  he  was  as  free  from  mercenary  influences  as  he  was 
at  the  law.     Mr.  Robert  D.  McDonald,  of  Danville,  has  told 


522  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER 

how  the  young  men  of  Pontiac  engaged  him  to  lecture  at  the 
Presbyterian  church  without  agreeing  on  terms  in  advance. 
"When  I  came  to  settle  with  the  speaker  out  of  the  receipts 
from  a  full  house,  Mr.  Lincoln  took  the  first  ten  dollar  bill  I 
handed  him  and  threw  up  his  hands  as  he  protested  Tor  Heav- 
en's sake  don't  give  me  any  more ;  ten  dollars  is  all  it  is 
worth.'  " 

Mr.  James  S.  Ewing  commenced  the  practice  of  law  at 
about  the  time  of  Lincoln's  election  to  the  presidency  and  is 
now  in  the  practice  in  Bloomington.  Probably  no  one  now 
living  is  better  qualified  from  personal  knowledge  and  under- 
standing to  speak  of  Lincoln,  the  lawyer.  He  said:*  "When 
I  first  knew  anything  of  courts,  it  was  the  habit  for  such 
lawyers  as  possessed  sufficient  experience  and  ability  to  attract 
a  clientage  to  follow  the  court  around  the  circuit.  Mr.  Lincoln 
was  of  this  number  and,  more  than  any  other,  was  most  con- 
stant in  his  attendance.  During  fifteen  years  I  heard  him  try 
a  great  many  lawsuits.  Lincoln  was  a  master  in  all  that  went, 
to  make  up  what  was  called  a  jury  lawyer.  His  wonderful 
power  of  clear  and  logical  statement  seemed  the  beginning  and 
end  of  the  case.  After  his  statement  of  the  law  and  the  facts 
we  wondered  either  how  the  plaintiff  came  to  bring  such  a 
suit,  or  how  the  defendant  could  be  such  a  fool  as  to  defend 
it.  By  the  time  the  jury  was  selected,  each  member  of  it  felt 
that  the  great  lawyer  was  his  friend,  and  was  relying  on  him 
as  a  juror  to  see  that  no  injustice  was  done.  Mr.  Lincoln's 
ready,  homely,  but  always  pertinent,  illustrations,  incidents, 
and  anecdotes,  could  not  be  resisted. 

"Few  men  ever  lived  who  knew,  as  he  did,  the  main  springs 
of  action,  secret  motives,  the  passions,  prejudices,  and  inclina- 


*  Address  at  Bloomington,  Feb.  12,  1909. 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER  523 

tions  which  inspired  the  actions  of  men,  and  he  played  on  the 
human  heart  as  a  master  on  an  instrument.  This  power  over 
a  jury  was,  however,  the  least  of  his  claims  to  be  entitled  a 
good  lawyer.  He  was  masterful  in  a  legal  argument  before 
the  court.  His  knowledge  of  the  general  principles  of  the  law 
was  extensive  and  accurate,  and  his  mind  so  clear  and  logical 
that  he  seldom  made  a  mistake  in  their  application." 

The  best  of  Lincoln's  earlier  biographers  was  Isaac  N. 
Arnold,  a  lawyer  of  no  mean  ability,  and  a  member  of  Congress 
from  Illinois  during  the  Civil  War  and  afterwards.  This  is 
his  estimate: 

"Lincoln  was,  upon  the  whole,  the  strongest  jury  lawyer 
in  the  state.  He  had  the  ability  to  perceive  with  almost  intui- 
tive quickness  the  decisive  point  in  the  case.  In  the  examina- 
tion and  cross-examination  of  a  witness  he  had  no  equal.  He 
could  compel  a  witness  to  tell  the  truth  when  he  meant  to  lie, 
and  if  a  witness  lied  he  rarely  escaped  exposure  under  Lincoln's 
cross-examination.  .  .  .  His  legal  arguments  .  .  .  were  al- 
ways clear,  vigorous,  and  logical,  seeking  to  convince  rather  by 
the  application  of  principle  than  by  the  citation  of  cases.  A 
stranger  going  into  court  when  he  was  trying  a  cause  would, 
after  a  few  moments,  find  himself  on  Lincoln's  side  and  wish- 
ing him  success.  He  seemed  to  magnetize  everyone.  He  was  so 
straight-forward,  so  direct,  so  candid,  that  every  spectator  was 
impressed  with  the  idea  that  he  was  seeking  only  truth  and  jus- 
tice. He  excelled  in  the  statement  of  his  case.  However 
complicated,  he  would  disentangle  it  and  present  the  real  issue 
in  so  simple  and  clear  a  way  that  all  could  understand.  Indeed, 
his  statement  often  rendered  argument  unnecessary,  and  fre- 
quently the  court  would  stop  him  and  say:  Tf  that  is  the 
case,  Brother  Lincoln,  we  will  hear  the  other  side.'*     His  illus- 


*Isaac  N.  Arnold,  Life  of  Abraham  Lincoln,  p.  84  (Chicago,  1885). 


524  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER 

trations  were  often  quaint  and  homely,  but  always  apt  and 
clear,  and  often  decisive.  He  always  met  his  opponent's  case 
fairly  and  squarely,  and  never  intentionally  misstated  law  or 
evidence." 

No  one  knew  Lincoln  the  lawyer  better  than  David  Davis, 
once  judge  of  the  Eighth  circuit  and  then  associate  justice  of 
the  supreme  court  of  the  United  States.    He  said : 

"I  enjoyed  for  over  twenty  years  the  personal  friendship 
of  Mr.  Lincoln.  We  were  admitted  to  the  bar  about  the 
same  time  and  traveled  for  many  years  what  is  known  in 
Illinois  as  the  eighth  judicial  circuit.  In  1848,  when  I  first 
went  on  the  bench,  the  circuit  embraced  fourteen  counties, 
and  Mr.  Lincoln  went  with  the  court  to  every  county.  Rail- 
roads were  not  then  in  use,  and  our  mode  of  travel  was  either 
on  horseback  or  in  buggies.  Mr.  Lincoln  was  transferred 
from  the  bar  of  the  circuit  to  the  office  of  president  of  the 
United  States,  having  been  without  official  position  since  1849. 
In  all  the  elements  that  constitute  a  great  lawyer,  Mr.  Lincoln 
had  few  equals.  He  was  great  both  at  nisi  prius  and  before 
an  appellate  tribunal.  He  seized  the  strong  points  of  a  cause 
and  presented  them  with  clearness  and  great  compactness.  His 
mind  was  logical  and  direct,  and  he  did  not  indulge  in  extra- 
neous discussion.  His  power  of  comparison  was  large  and  he 
rarely  failed  in  a  legal  discussion  to  use  that  mode  of  reason- 
ing. The  framework  of  his  mental  and  moral  being  was  hon- 
esty, and  a  wrong  cause  was  poorly  defended  by  him.  In 
order  to  bring  into  full  activity  his  great  powers,  it  was  neces- 
sary that  he  should  be  convinced  of  the  right  and  justice  of  the 
matter  which  he  advocated.  When  so  convinced,  whether  the 
cause  was  great  or  small,  he  was  usually  successful.  He  hated 
wrong  and  oppression  everywhere,  and  many  a  man  whose 
fraudulent  conduct  was  undergoing  review  in  a  court  of 
justice  has  writhed  under  his  terrible  indignation  and  rebuke." 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER  525 

The  wisdom  of  Daniel  Webster  was  crystallized  into  a 
single  sentence  of  the  Gettysburg  address.  The  poetry  and 
philosophy  of  a  thousand  years  of  Hebrew  prophecy  was  re- 
stated in  a  paragraph  of  the  Second  Inaugural.  The  history 
of  the  Constitution,  in  the  making  and  after,  so  far  as  it  relates 
to  the  slavery  question,  is  put  in  an  hour's  argument  in  the 
Cooper  Union  oration.  The  faith  of  a  student  and  protag- 
onist of  the  Constitution,  that  real  human  rights,  even  the 
rights  under  the  odious  slave  trade  are  unassailable  is  uttered 
in  the  First  Inaugural.  Greatest  of  all  these  is  the  Cooper 
Union  speech,  where  Lincoln  demonstrated  that  the  members 
of  the  Convention  which  framed  the  Constitution  favored  the 
ultimate  extinction  of  slavery.  The  demonstration  disclosed 
an  intimate  knowledge  of  American  history  that  none  but  a 
specialist  could  have  acquired  in  a  life-long  pursuit  of  the 
study.  The  letters,  speeches,  votes  and  official  acts  of  23  of 
the  39  members  of  the  Constitutional  Convention,  commencing 
with  the  Congress  of  1784  and  concluding  in  1820,  had  been 
brought  out  of  obscure  sources,  no  one  knows  where,  and 
analyzed  and  digested  by  this  intensive  student,  master  of 
constitutional  law,  at  his  prairie  home  until  he  was  able  to 
make  his  demonstration,  seventy  years  after,  that  the  fathers 
of  the  Constitution  at  the  birth  of  the  republic  had  adopted  the 
views  as  to  the  constitutional  extinction  of  the  slave  power 
which  Lincoln  and  his  colleagues  were  advocating  in  1860. 
The  analysis  covers  in  detail  the  votes  of  the  individual  mem- 
bers of  the  convention  of  1787  as  given  upon  the  Act  excluding 
slavery  from  the  Northwest  Territory  in  1784,  the  Ordinance 
of  1787,  the  Act  of  1789  putting  the  ordinance  into  effect, 
passed  by  Congress  and  signed  by  Washington,  the  Act  or- 
ganizing Mississippi  as  a  Territory  in  1798  and  Louisiana  Ter- 
ritory in  1804,  and  finally  the  Missouri  Compromise  of  1820. 


526  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,   LAWYER 

The  same  scholarship  shown  in  his  application  of  constitu- 
tional history  to  the  slavery  question  he  displays  as  a  student 
at  law  in  his  analysis  of  the  Dred  Scott  decision  in  the  Cooper 
Institute  address  and  elsewhere.  It  is  criticism  at  its  best  and 
it  is  always  profound — I  need  only  quote  a  sentence  where  he 
contrasts  the  position  taken  by  the  makers  of  the  Constitution 
with  that  assumed  by  the  Supreme  Justices  in  the  Dred  Scott 
decision  to  show  how  clearly  Lincoln,  the  constitutional  lawyer, 
made  his  point: 

"And  then  it  is  to  be  remembered  that  'our  fathers  who 
framed  the  government  under  which  we  live' — the  men  who 
made  the  Constitution — decided  this  same  constitutional  ques- 
tion in  our  favor  long  ago ;  decided  it  without  division  among 
themselves  when  making  the  decision ;  without  division  among 
themselves  about  the  meaning  of  it  after  it  was  made,  and  so 
far  as  any  evidence  is  left,  without  basing  it  upon  any  mis- 
taken statement  of  facts." 

It  is  more  than  fidelity  to  the  Constitution,  as  a  fetish  to 
worship  with  one's  eyes  closed,  that  Lincoln  displayed  in  his 
handling  of  the  crucial  problem  of  slavery  under  the  Constitu- 
tion; it  is  rather  the  fidelity  of  an  apostle  to  his  Master,  who 
knows  what  he  believes  through  a  heart-searching  intimacy. 

We  have  seen  presidents  who  had  not  the  scholarship  and 
critical  sense  to  search  the  Constitution  for  the  power  they 
sought  to  wield.  We  have  known  presidents  who  had  not  the 
patience  to  work  out  a  difficult  problem  in  statecraft  under 
the  wise  restraint  of  constitutional  limitations ;  we  have  heard 
of  presidents  who  were  jealous  of  those  limitations  and 
brushed  aside  the  whole  moral  issue  of  obeying  a  constitutional 
oath  as  if  to  say  with  Mr.  Dooley,  "What's  the  Constitution 
betune  friends?"  Lincoln,  the  man  of  critical  scholarship,  of 
endless  patience  in  constitutional  research,  would  not  commit 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,   LAWYER  527 

the  shallow  folly  of  criticising  the  Supreme  Court  or  ignoring 
the  requirements  of  our  Constitution  as  more  than  one  of  our 
presidents  have  done. 

As  Lincoln  wrote  to  Colonel  Albert  G.  Hodges  of  Ken- 
tucky, April  4,  1864 : 

"I  am  naturally  antislavery.  If  slavery  is  not  wrong, 
nothing  is  wrong.  I  can  not  remember  when  I  did  not  so 
think  and  feel,  and  yet  I  have  never  understood  that  the  presi- 
dency conferred  upon  me  an  unrestricted  right  to  act  officially 
upon  this  judgment  and  feeling.  It  was  in  the  oath  I 
took,  that  I  would,  to  the  best  of  my  ability,  preserve,  protect, 
and  defend  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States.  I  could  not 
take  the  office  without  taking  the  oath.  Nor  was  it  my  view 
that  I  might  take  an  oath  to  get  power,  and  break  the  oath  in 
using  the  power." 

One  who  doubts  Lincoln's  erudition  needs  only  read  the 
state  papers  of  the  War  President  on  constitutional  questions. 
The  language  employed  by  Chief  Justice  Chase  in  Texas  v. 
White,  7  Wall.  700,  in  defining  the  constitutional  relation  of 
a  seceding  state  with  the  Union  follows  closely  the  theory  of 
the  president  as  advanced  in  his  state  papers  and  letters  and 
differs  radically  from  the  dominant  opinion  that  prevailed  in 
the  radical  majority  of  the  post-war  congress.  They  were  a 
part  of  an  indissoluble  union  of  indestructible  states;  their 
citizens  were  citizens  of  the  United  States ;  secession  was  a 
fallacy,  for  the  seceders  were  in  the  Union  all  the  time.* 

In  the  Douglas  debates,  in  his  first  inaugural  address, 
and  in  the  emergencies  of  the  Civil  War  of  which  the  Mason 
and  Slidell  incident  is  a  type  when  he  had  to  overrule  his 
advisers  and   render  his  own   final   judgment,   and  in   every 


*See  Lincoln's  last  public  address  delivered  on  April  n,   1865. 


528  ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,   LAWYER 

significant  utterance  as  president,  are  to  be  found  the  proof 
of  the  trained  lawyer.  With  politics  and  history  this  paper 
has  nothing  to  do.  It  is  the  country  lawyer  whose  career  we 
have  been  studying.  To  the  questions,  Who  taught  the  author 
of  the  Gettysburg  oration  and  the  Second  Inaugural?  and 
Whence  came  that  simplicity  of  style?  we  have  sought  our  an- 
swer in  the  story  of  his  career  at  the  law,  of  how  he  began,  as  a 
boy,  with  the  determination  to  make  his  thought  plain,  of 
the  influence  of  his  public-spirited  teachers,  the  opportunities 
he  had  in  the  Black  Hawk  War  and  in  the  legislature  to  know 
the  men  who  were  to  control  public  opinion  in  the  new  state, 
the  value  of  a  giant  strength  which  enabled  him  to  endure 
the  hardships  of  the  life  on  the  circuit  and  thrive  upon  them, 
and  how,  in  all  these  experiences,  two  ambitions  controlled 
him — to  master  the  study  of  human  nature,  and  to  express  his 
thought  "in  language  plain  enough  for  any  boy  to  compre- 
hend." 

Men  of  America  have  erected  a  shrine  for  Abraham  Lin- 
coln. Some  love  to  recall  him  as  he  appealed  to  his  "dissat- 
isfied fellow-countrymen"  in  1861 ;  others,  as  he  dedicated  the 
national  cemetery  at  Gettysburg.  To  others  he  is  to  be  remem- 
bered as  the  great  emancipator.  The  boys  who  wore  the  blue, 
and  who  now  wear  the  grey  of  God's  providing,  think  of  him 
as  the  "Father  Abraham"  of  the  armies  of  the  Union.  To 
others  there  comes  the  picture  of  a  man  of  sorrows  whose  life 
at  Washington  was  one  long  heartbreak  and  whose  only  cheer 
came  when  he  could  pardon  a  soldier  boy.  He  is  no  less  a 
man  whom  we  see — in  fancy  or  in  memory — the  simple-minded 
country  lawyer,  who  loved  the  children,  and  who  understood 
human  nature  as  he  studied  it  in  the  uncouth  countrymen  of  a 
prairie  frontier.  As  he  stood  outside  the  courthouse,  long 
after  court  had  adjourned,  explaining  things  to  the  neighbors 


ABRAHAM    LINCOLN,    LAWYER  529 

and  friends  who  gathered  to  hear  his  talk,  we  can  see  his 
giant  figure  with  its  earnest,  kindly  face,  traced  in  the  twilight 
of  an  autumn  evening  against  the  rude  brick  wall, — the  figure 
of  Lincoln,  the  country  lawyer,  trusted  and  loved  by  all  who 
knew  him. 


APPENDIX 

Lincoln's  cases  in  the  Illinois  Supreme  Court  as  published 
in  Frederick  Trevor  Hill's  Lincoln  the  Lawyer,  published  by 
The  Century  Company,  1906. 

Scammon  v.  Cline,  3  Ills.,  456. 
Cannon  v.  Kinney,  4  Ills.,  9. 
Maus  v.  Worthing,  4  Ills.,  26. 
Bailey  v.  Cromwell,  4  Ills.,  71. 
Ballentine  v.  Beall,  4  Ills.,  203. 
Elkin  v.  The  People,  4  Ills.,  207. 
Benedict  v.  Dellihunt,  4  Ills.,  287. 
Abrams  v.  Camp,  4  Ills.,  291. 
Hancock  v.  Hodgson,  4  Ills.,  329. 
Grable  v.  Margrave,  4  Ills.,  372. 
Averill  v.  Field,  4  Ills.,  390. 
Wilson  v.  Alexander,  4  Ills.,  392. 
Schlenker  v.  Risley,  4  Ills.,  483. 
Mason  v.  Park,  4  Ills.,  532. 
Greathouse  v.  Smith,  4  Ills.,  541. 
Watkins  v.  White,  4  Ills.,  549. 
Payne  v.  Frazier,  5  Ills.,  55 
Fitch  v.  Pinckard,  5  Ills.,  69. 
Edwards  v.  Helm,  5  Ills.,  142. 
Grubb  v.  Crane,  5  Ills.,  153. 
Pentacost  v.  Magahee,  5  Ills.,  326. 
Robinson  v.  Chesseldine,  5  Ills.,  332. 
Lazell  v.  Francis,  5  Ills.,  421. 
Spear  v.  Campbell,  5  Ills.,  424. 
Bruce  v.  Truett,  5  Ills.,  454. 
England  v.  Clark,  5  Ills.,  486. 
Johnson  v.  Weedman,  5  Ills.,  495. 
Hall  v.  Perkins,  5  Ills.,  548. 

531 


Lockbridge  v.  Foster,  5  Ills.,  569. 

Dorman  v.  Lane,  6  Ills.,  143. 

Davis  v.  Harkness,  6  Ills.,  173. 

Martin  v.  Dreyden,  6  Ills.,  187. 

Warner  v.  Helm,  6  Ills.,  226. 

Favor  v.  Marlett,  6  Ills.,  385. 

Parker  v.  Smith,  6  Ills.,  411. 

Stickney  v.  Cassell,  6  Ills.,  418. 

Kimball  v.  Cook,  6  Ills.,  423. 

Wren  v.  Moss,  6  Ills.,  560. 

Morgan  v.  Griffin,  6  Ills.,  565. 

Cook  v.  Hall,  6  Ills.,  575. 

Fields  v.  Rawlings,  6  Ills.,  581. 

Broadwell  v.  Broadwell,  6  Ills.,  599. 

Rogers  v.  Dickey,  6  Ills.,  636. 

Kelly  v.  Garrett,  6  Ills.,  649. 

McCall  v.  Lesher,  7  Ills.,  46. 

McCall  v.  Lesher,  7  Ills.,  47. 

Wren  v.  Moss,  7  Ills.,  72. 

Risinger  v.  Cheney,  7  Ills.,  84. 

Eldridge  v.  Rowe,  7  Ills.,  91. 

Frisby  v.  Ballance,  7  Ills.,  141. 

Hall  v.  Irwin,  7  Ills.,  176. 

City  of  Springfield  v.  Hickox,  7  Ills.,  241. 

Ross  v.  Nesbit,  7  Ills.,  252. 

Simpson  v.  Ranlett,  7  Ills.,  312. 

Murphy  v.  Summerville,  7  Ills.,  360. 

Trailor  v.  Hill,  7  Ills.,  364. 

Chase  v.  Debolt,  7  Ills.,  371. 

Smith  v.  Byrd,  7  Ills.,  412. 

Moore  v.  Hamilton,  7  Ills.,  429. 

McNamara  v.  King,  7  Ills.,  432. 

Ellis  v.  Locke,  7  Ills.,  459. 

Bryan  v.  Wash,  7  Ills.,  557. 

Wright  v.  Bennett,  7  Ills.,  587. 

Kincaid  v.  Turner,  7  Ills.,  618. 

Cunningham  v.  Fithian,  7  Ills.,  650. 

Wilson  v.  Van  Winkle,  7  Ills.,  684. 

Patterson  v.  Edwards,  7  Ills.,  720. 

532 


Driggs  v.  Gear,  8  Ills.,  2. 

Edgar  Co.  v.  Mayo,  8  Ills.,  82. 

Roney  v.  Monaghan,  8  Ills.,  85. 

The  People  v.  Brown,  8  Ills.,  87. 

Munsell  v.  Temple,  8  Ills.,  93. 

Fell  v.  Price,  8  Ills.,  186. 

Wright  v.  Taylor,  8  Ills.,  193. 

Welch  v.  Sykes,  8  Ills.,  197. 

Hawks  v.  Lands,  8  Ills.,  227. 

Garret  v.  Stevenson,  8  Ills.,  261. 

Henderson  v.  Welch,  8  Ills.,  340. 

Cowles  v.  Cowles,  8  Ills.,  435. 

Wilcoxon  v.  Roby,  8  Ills.,  475. 

Trumbull  v.  Campbell,  8  Ills.,  502. 

Cooper  v.  Crosby,  8  Ills.,  506. 

Shaeffer  v.  Weed  8  Ills.,  511. 

Anderson  v.  Ryan,  8  Ills.,  593. 

Wright  v.  McNeely,  11  Ills.,  241. 

Webster  v.  French,  11  Ills.,  254. 

Adams  v.  The  County  of  Logan,  II  Ills.,  336. 

Pearl  v.  Wellmans,  11  Ills.,  352. 

Lewis  v.  Moffett,  11  Ills.,  392. 

Austin  v.  The  People,  11  Ills.,  452. 

Williams  v.  Blankenship,  12  Ills.,  122. 

Smith  v.  Dunlap,  12  Ills.,  184. 

McHenry  v.  Watkins,  12  Ills.,  233. 

Whitecraft  v.  Vanderver,  12  Ills.,  235. 

Enos  v.  Capps,  12  Ills.,  255. 

Ward  v.  Owens,  12  Ills.,  283. 

Linton  v.  Anglin,  12  Ills.,  284. 

Penny  v.  Graves,  12  Ills.,  287. 

Compher  v.  The  People,  12  Ills.,  290. 

Major  v.  Hawkes,  12  Ills.,  298. 

Webster  v.  French,  12  Ills.,  302. 

The  People  v.  Marshall,  12  Ills.,  391. 

Dunlap  v.  Smith,  12  Ills.,  399. 

Dorman  v.  Tost,  13  Ills.,  127. 

Perry  v.  McHenry,  13  Ills.,  227. 

McArtee  v.  Engart,  13  Ills.,  242. 

533 


Manly  v.  Gibson,  13  Ills.,  308. 

Harris  v.  Shaw,  13  Ills.,  456. 

Banet  v.  The  Alton  &  Sangamon  R.  R.  Co.,  13  Ills.,  504. 

Klein  v.  The  Alton  &  Sangamon  R.  R.  Co.,  13  Ills.,  514. 

Casey  v.  Casey,  14  Ills.,  112. 

Ross  v.  Irving,  14  Ills.,  171. 

Pryor  v.  Irving,  14  Ills.,  171. 

Alton  &  Sangamon  R.  R.  Co.  v.  Carpenter,   14  Ills.,  190. 

Alton  &  Sangamon  R.  R.  Co.  v.  Baugh,  14  Ills.,  211. 

Stewartson  v.  Stewartson,  15  Ills.,  145. 

Byrne  v.  Stout,  15  Ills.,  180. 

Pate  v.  The  People,  15  Ills.,  221. 

Sullivan  v.  The  People,  15  Ills.,  233. 

Humphreys  v.  Spear,  15  Ills.,  275. 

The  People  v.  Blackford,  16  Ills.,  166. 

Edmunds  v.  Myers,  16  Ills.,  207. 

Edmunds  v.  Hildreth,  16  Ills.,  214. 

Gilman  v.  Hamilton,  16  Ills.,  225. 

The  Chicago,  Burlington  &  Quincy  R.  R.  v.  Wilson,  17  Ills., 
123. 

Browning  v.  The  City  of  Springfield,  17  Ills.,  143. 

Turley  v.  The  County  of  Logan,  17  Ills.,  151. 

Armstrong  v.  Mock,  17  Ills.,  166. 

Booth  v.  Rives,  17  Ills.,  175. 

Myers  v.  Turner,  17  Ills.,  179. 

Hildreth  v.  Turner,  17  Ills,  184. 

Moore  v.  Vali,  17  Ills.,  185. 

Moore  v.  Dodd,  17  Ills.,  185. 

Loomis  v.  Francis,  17  Ills,  206. 

The  Illinois  Central  Railroad  Co.  v.  The  County  of  Mc- 
Lean, 17  Ills,  291. 

Johnson  v.  Richardson,  17  Ills,  302. 

Phelps  v.  McGee,  18  Ills,  155. 

County  of  Christian  v.  Overholt,  18  Ills,  223. 

McConnell  v.  The  Delaware  M.  S.  Ins.  Co,  18  Ills,  228. 

The  People  v.  Watkins,  19  Ills,  117. 

Partlow  v.  Williams,  19  Ills,  132. 

Illinois  Central  R.  R.  Co.  v.  Morrison  &  Crabtree,  19  Ills, 
136. 

534 


Illinois  Central  R.  R.  Co.  v.  Hays,  19  Ills.,  166. 

The  People  v.  Witt,  19  Ills.,  169. 

Sprague  v.  The  Illinois  River  R.  Co.,  19  Ills.,  174. 

McDaniel  v.  Correll,  19  Ills.,  226. 

The  People  v.  Bissell,  19  Ills.,  229. 

The  People  v.  Hatch,  19  Ills.,  283. 

Wade  v.  King,  19  Ills.,  301. 

Kester  v.  Stark,  19  Ills.,  328. 

St.  Louis,  Chicago  &  Alton  R.  R.  Co.  v.  Dalby,  19  Ills.,  353. 

Laughlin  v.  Marshall,  19  Ills.,  390. 

The  People  v.  Ridgeley,  21  Ills.,  65. 

Tonica  &  Petersburg  R.  R.  Co.  v.  Stein,  21  Ills.,  96. 

Trustees  of  Schools  v.  Allen,  21  Ills.,  120. 

Crabtree  v.  Kile,  21  Ills.,  180. 

Town  of  Petersburg  v.  Metzker,  21  Ills.,  205. 

Young  v.  Ward,  21  Ills.,  223. 

Smith  v.  Smith,  21  Ills.,  244. 

Terre  Haute  &  Alton  R.  R.  Co.  v.  Earp,  21  Ills.,  291. 

Brundage  v.  Camp,  21  Ills.,  330. 

Constant  v.  Matteson,  22  Ills.,  546. 

Leonard  v.  Adm'r  of  Villars,  23  Ills.,  377. 

Cass  v.  Perkins,  23  Ills.,  382. 

Ritchey  v.  West,  23  Ills.,  385. 

Miller  v.  Whittaker,  23  Ills.,  453. 

Young  v.  Miller,  23  Ills.,  453. 

Gill  v.  Hoblit,  23  Ills.,  473. 

Kinsey  v.  Nisley,  23  Ills.,  505. 

Gregg  v.  Sanford,  24  Ills.,  17. 

Columbus  Machine  Manufacturing  Co.  v.  Dorwin,  25  Ills., 

169. 
Columbus  Machine  Manufacturing  Co.  v.  Ulrich,  25   Ills., 

169. 


535 


GENERAL  INDEX 


Architecture,  early,  230,  236. 

Aurora,  alarm  at  in  Morgan's  raid,  172-5. 

Belleville,  established,  224,  225. 

Black  Hawk  war,  Lincoln  in,  486-7. 

Bowling  Green,  National  road  at,  215 ;  county  seat  moved  from,  225. 

Braddock's  expedition,  210-211. 

Brandenburg,  Ky.,  Kidnaping  case  at,  134 ;  Morgan  crosses  at,  143 ; 
relative  location  of,  146;  news  from,  156. 

Brazil,  established,  225 ;  taverns  near,  233. 

Bridgeport,  tavern  at,  233. 

British,  contest  for  Ohio  Valley,  209-211;  course  after  Revolution- 
ary war,  295-7;  300-302;  310,  313,  317. 

Brookville,  early  water  works  at,  281-2. 

Bryansburg,  Morgan's  raid  at,  148. 

Buffalo,  ("Illinois  cattle")  plan  to  ship  to  Canada,  91,  94. 

Cambridge  City,  established,  224;  taverns  at,  231. 

Canton,  Morgan's  raid  at,  147,  164. 

Carignan,  Regiment  de,  soldiers  settle  in  Canada,  106. 

Cattle,  plan  to  transport  from  Illinois  to  Canada,  91,  94. 

Centerville,  Morgan's  raid  at,  147. 

Central  Plank  Road  Company,  234-5. 

Centerville,  National  road  at,  215,  216;  "boom"  at,  224;  mails  at, 
227;  taverns  at,  230. 

Chevalier — significance  of  word,  105. 

Chickasaws,  Indian  tribe,  French  war  with,  97-104. 

Cholera,  in  Indiana,  275-6,  284. 

Church,  opposition  to  Columbus,  459-461. 

Civil  war,  stature  of  troops  in,  367-371 ;  406,  411,  416,  419-420. 

Clay  County,  taverns  in,  233. 

Columbia  City,  307 — note. 

Corydon,  Morgan's  raid  at,  141,  142,  144,  147;  fight  near,  160-1; 
pillage  at,  163 ;  capital,  242. 

Courts,  Circuit,  organization  of,  185. 

Cross  Plains,  Morgan's  raid  at,  148. 

Cumberland,  Ind.,  tavern  at,  232. 


537 


538  INDEX 

Cumberland  road,  origin  of,  209-214.     See  National  road. 

Danville,  National  road  at,  215. 

DePauw  University,  located,  225. 

Detroit,  founding  of,  36;  siege  of  in  1712,  44-71. 

Diphtheria,  prevention  of,  291. 

Diseases,  in  early  Indiana,  272,  275,  276,  277,  284 ;  ignorance  of  germ 

diseases,  272-5 ;  modern  prevention,  289-291 ;  germs  carried  by 

animals,  290. 
Distillery,  Jenck's,  217-8. 
Dover,  Morgan's  raid  at,  148. 

Dupont,  Morgan's  raid  at,  144,  148,  169,  170,  171-2. 
Eagle  creek,  217. 

Eel  river,  troubles  at,  323,  329-332 ;  337,  340,  343. 
Elrod,  Morgan's  raid  at,  148. 

English,  seek  trade  with  French  Indian  allies,  71-2,  87-9. 
English  Prairie,  111.,  246. 
Esdras,  division  of  globe  by,  460. 
Fasting  and  prayer,  for  epidemic  diseases,  276. 
Finney's  Ford,  battle  of,  170. 
Field  notes,  of  survey  of  National  road,  215-6. 
Fire  prevention,  at  Vincennes,  282-3. 
Flint  Island,  Rebel  raiders  cross  at,  136. 
Fort  Defiance,  304 — note. 
Fort  Duquesne,  built,  210;  abandoned,  211. 
Fort  Harmar,  307,  308. 
Fort  Washington,  307 — note. 
Fort  Wayne,  Miamis  locate  at  site  of,  71 ;  called  "post  of  Kiskakon," 

74-5;   fort  built  at,  4,  82-3;  board  of  health  at,  279;  life  at  in 

1790,  293-361. 
French,    contest   control    of   Ohio   Valley,    209-211;    early   customs, 

295-361. 
Fort  William  Henry,  capture  of,  124-5. 
Fourth  of  July,  early  celebrations,  196;  261-2. 
Fox    Indians,    with    Mascoutins,   make   war    on   French   at    Detroit, 

45-52 ;  defeat  and  slaughter  of,  53-66,  68-71 ;  later  hostility,  84. 
Freeman  case,  (fugitive  slave)   197-8. 
"Friars  of  St.  Andrew,"  299,  342,  346. 
Friendship,  Morgan's  raid  at,  148. 
Friponne,  storehouse,  352,  354. 
Frontier,  stature  conditions,  370-1 ;  417-8. 


INDEX  539 

Grand  Glaize,  304,  306— note,  361. 

Great  Meadows,  battle  of,  210. 

Greencastle,  National  road  at,  215. 

Greenfield,  established,  224. 

Haiti,  Columbus  in,  471,  476,  479. 

Hardinsburg,  Rebel  raid  at,  137. 

Harrison,  O.,  Morgan's  raid  at,  145,  149,  177. 

Harrison  Prairie,  218. 

Harristown,  Morgan's  raid  at,  147. 

Health  board,  first  in  Indiana,  276;  at  Madison,  278;  at  Blooming- 
ton,  279;  State  board  created,  286;  work  of,  287-291. 

Health  ordinances,  274,  275,  276. 

Henryville,  Morgan's  raid  at,  147. 

Heredity,  influence  on  stature,  369,  393;  in  Buskirk  family,  425-432. 

Hinesville,  Morgan's  raid  at,  147. 

"Hoosier,"  tradition  of  origin  of  word,  388. 

Illinois,  Lincoln's  removal  to,  486;  early  life  in,  487-8;  law  practice 
in,  489-535 ;  cases  in  Supreme  Court,  531-5. 

Indiana,  congressional  districts  in  1864,  415 ;  covered  in  Pope  Alex- 
ander's grant  to  Spain,  450-1 ;  Lincoln's  boyhood  in,  484-6. 

Indiana  Central  railroad,  236. 

"Indiana  Gazette,"  quoted,  222,  277. 

''Indiana  Republican,"  271,  276,  278,  279,  283. 

Indiana  State  Medical  Society,  records,  271-2;  organization,  284; 
work  of,  285-7. 

Indianans,  stature  of,  367-447. 

Indianapolis,  Public  Library,  promotion  of,  196;  National  road 
brought  to,  214-5,  217;  construction  from,  218-220;  road  mac- 
adamized, 222;  taverns  at,  212-3;  early  history  of,  241-267  (these 
pages  are  erroneously  numbered  1-27,  and  240  is  to  be  added  to 
each  page  for  correct  numbering)  ;  early  diseases,  277. 

Indians,  incited  by  British,  295-6;  310;  slavery  among,  310;  cruel- 
ties, 313;  British  counsel,  317,  323,  343-6,  358-360;  measurements 
of,  410. 

Iroquois  Indians,  western  Indians  urged  to  war  on,  by  French,  34; 
troubles  with,  35,  42;  measurements  of,  410. 

Isle  of  Oeufs,  fisheries  established  at,  26. 

Isthmus  of  Panama,  Columbus  at,  476. 

Kankakee  river,  effort  to  locate  Indians  on,  82 ;  Indians  leave,  83. 

Kiskakon,  Indian  town,  site  of  Fort  Wayne,  74-5. 


540  INDEX 

Knightstown,  established,  224 ;  tavern  at,  232. 

La  Balme's  defeat,  338. 

La  Roche  river,  (i.  e.  the  Big  Miami)  74. 

Law,  practice  of  in  Illinois,  489-535. 

Lawrenceburg,  Morgan's  raid  alarms,  172-6,  181. 

Leavenworth,  Rebel  raid  near,  138. 

Lexington,  Morgan's  raid  at,  144,  146,  147,  167,  169. 

Licking  river,  307. 

Logan,  Morgan's  raid  at,  148. 

Losantiville,  307. 

Madison,  first  health  ordinance,  275;  board  of  health,  276;  cholera 

at,  276-7;  water  works,  279-281. 
"Madison  Courier,"  271,  281. 

Magnetic  needle,  declination  of  noted  by  Columbus,  465. 
Mails,  early,  227. 
Marietta,  O.,  242,  307,  308. 
Marion  County,  early  court  of,  185-6;  court  house,  188;  early  bar, 

189 ;  later  members,  207. 
Marion  County  Medical  Society,  283. 
Mascoutins,  Indian  tribe,  beseige  Detroit  in  1712,  45-52;  defeat  and 

slaughter  of,  53-66,  68-71. 
Mauckport,  Morgan's  raid  begins  at,  149,  150;  houses  pillaged,  154; 

fight  near,  159. 
Maumee  river,  Miamis  locate  on,  71 ;  portage,  301,  307. 
Medical  societies,  state,  271-2,  284;  earliest  organization,  283. 
Memphis,  Ind.,  Morgan's  raid  at,  147,  165-6,  167. 
Mexican  war,  stature  of  troops  in,  403-4. 
Miamis,  Indians,  illicit  sales  of  liquor  to,  35-39 ;  Sieur  de  Vincennes 

with,  35-9 ;  troubles  with  Iroquois,  40-3 ;  aid  French  at  Detroit. 

45,  50-61 ;  locate  on  Maumee,  71 ;  friendly  to  French,  72-3 ;  de- 
fection of  La  Demoiselle,  74-5. 
Miamitown,  (site  of  Fort  Wayne)  300-302,  305. 
"Miasm,"  272. 

Milan,  Morgan's  raid  at,  148,  174. 
Mill  Creek,  taverns  at,  233. 
Mingan,  fort  at,  27;  grant  of  Fief,  29;  lease  to  Louis  Jolliet,  30; 

contest  over  title,  77-8. 
Mississinewa  river,  344. 
Monroe  County  Grenadiers,  423-5. 
Moore's  Hill,  Morgan's  raid  at,  148,  174,  177. 


INDEX  541 

Morgan's  raid  in  Indiana,  133-183;  preceding  troubles,  133-9;  Shack- 
elford's account,  141;  General  Hobson's  account,  142-3;  Basil 
Duke's  account,  143-5 ;  Morgan's  forces,  145 ;  route  followed, 
146-9;  nature  of  country  raided,  150-2;  beginning  of,  153-6; 
preparations  for  defense,  157-8;  details  of  raids,  159-178;  cost 
to  state,  182. 

Mosquitos,  as  disease  carriers,  290. 

Mt.  Jackson,  tavern  at,  232-3. 

Music,  early,  at  Indianapolis,  249-252 ;  at  Fort  Wayne,  314-5. 

Muskackatuck  river,  Morgan's  raid  reaches,  148. 

Napoleon,  Morgan's  raid  at,  148,  174. 

National  road,  grows  out  of  Cumberland  road,  209-14;  course 
altered  in  Indiana,  214-5 ;  surveys  in  Indiana,  216-7 ;  appropria- 
tions for,  218,  237;  construction,  219-222;  travel  on,  222-4; 
towns  on,  222-5 ;  mail  coaches,  226-9 ;  taverns,  230-4 ;  disposal 
of,  235-7;  field  notes  of  survey,  215-6. 

Natt,  Indian  flag,  359. 

New  Albany,  kidnaping  case  at,  134;  in  Morgan's  raid,  151. 

New  Alsace,  Morgan's  raid  at,  148,  177. 

New  Amsterdam,  disloyalty  at,  139. 

Newburg,  Rebel  raid  at,  134-5. 

New  Philadelphia,  Morgan's  raid  at,  147. 

New  Purchase,  243. 

Ohio,  admission  to  Union,  212. 

Ohio  Land  Company,  209-210. 

Orleans,  Rebel  raid  at,  137. 

Osgood,  Morgan's  raid  at,  148,  174. 

Ottagamies.     See  Fox  Indians. 

Ottawas,  Indian  tribe;  affront  French,  41. 

Ouabache,  name  applied  to  Ohio  river  below  mouth  of  Wabash, 
87,  89. 

Outagamies.     See  Fox  Indians. 

Ouyatanons.    See  Weas. 

Palmyra,  Morgan's  raid  at,  147. 

Pani,  defined,  310. 

Paris,  Morgan's  raid  at,  147,  165. 

Parrakeet,  former  Indiana  bird,  321. 

Patent  medicines,  285-6. 

Piankeshaws,  Miami  Indian  tribe,  led  to  Post  Vincennes,  90,  95, 
96;  return  to  Vermillion  river,  104. 


542  INDEX  ) 

Pierceville,  Morgan's  raid  at,  148,  175. 

Plainfield,  established,  224 ;  tavern  at,  233 ;  Henry  Clay  at,  234. 

Pogue's  creek,  217. 

Point  Levy,  Canada,  Bissot's  mill  at,  23;  tannery  at,  27. 

Pont  Audemer,  France,  place  of  origin  of  Sieurs  de  Vincennes,  9-11. 

Port  a  Choix,  industries  at,  30. 

Prairie  du  Masque,  304. 

Public  health,  sanitary  measures  of  past  century,  271-291. 

Putnamville,  established,  224 ;  growth,  225 ;  tavern  at,  233. 

Railroads,  Indiana,  in  1863;  151-2;  in  1851,  235-6;  proposed  sub- 
stitute for  National  road,  221-2. 

"Rebecca,"  British  vessel,  347. 

Richmond,  National  road  at,  215,  216 ;  taverns  at,  230. 

Richmond,  Va.,  242. 

River  a  l'Anguille.     See  Eel  river. 

River  aux  Ecorse,  303. 

River  Huron,  303. 

River  Raisin,  303,  304. 

Roche  de  Bout,  304. 

Ruisseau  de  Rioll,  327. 

St.  Joseph's  river,  effort  to  locate  Indians  on,  82 ;  town  on,  307. 

St.  Mary's  river,  306;  town  on,  307;  conditions  at  Miamitown,  315, 
327,  332,  346-353,  354,  358. 

Salem,  Morgan's  raid  at,  144,  147,  163-4,  168. 

Salisbury,  Morgan's  raid  at,  161. 

Salisbury,  former  town,  215. 

Sanitation.     See  Public  health. 

Science,  of  Columbus,  450-480 ;  mediaeval  geography,  456,  477. 

Sears'  New  Family  Recipe  Book,  quoted,  278. 

Shishequia,  Indian  rattle,  345. 

"Side  judges,"  defined,  185. 

Slaves,  fugitives,  law  governing,  197-8. 

Soldiers,  measurements  of,  402-420,  433-9. 

Sonnontouans,  (Seneca  tribe  of  Iroquois)  38. 

Southern  national  road,  suggested,  213. 

Spain,  interest  in  discoveries  of  Columbus,  450-2,  459,  463.  469, 
472-3,  475-6,  480. 

Spanish,  danger  of  western  alliance  with,  211. 

Spanish-American  war,  stature  of  Indiana  troops  in,  433-7. 

Spoon  river,  navigable,  495. 


INDEX  543 

State  Board  of  Health,  created,  286;  work  of,  287-291. 

"State  Road,"  215-6. 

Stature,  comparative,   of   Indianans,   367-447;   theories   of,  367-372, 

404-413,  417-9. 
Steamboat,  Alice  Dean,  captured  by  Morgan  raiders,  151-3;  burned, 

155. 
Steamboat,  Grey  Eagle,  intercepted  by  Rebels,  153. 
Steamboat,  Izetta,  fires  on  Rebels,  138. 
Steamboat,   J.   T.    McComb,    ferries    Morgan's   troops   across   Ohio 

river,  145,  151-4,  156. 
Steamboat,  Robert  Hanna,  220-1. 
Stilesville,  established,  224,  225. 
Sugar  making,  264-5. 
Sunday  School,  early,  261-2,  264. 
Sunman,  Morgan's  raid  at,  144,  148,  174-5. 
Superstitions,  mediaeval  as  to  earth,  461. 
Survey  of  National  road  in  Indiana,  215-8. 
Tadoussac,  Canada,  fisheries  company,  25. 
Taverns,  in  Indiana,  230-4,  248-9,  251-2,  258,  259. 
Teatiky,  (See  Kankakee)  82. 
Terre  Haute,  National  road  at,  217-220 ;  mails  at,  227 ;  taverns  at, 

233-4. 
Terre  Haute  &  Indianapolis  railroad,  235. 
Theatre,  first  in  Indianapolis,  258. 

Tippecanoe,  origin  and  corruption  of  name,  322 ;  troubles  at,  323. 
Tsonnontouans,  (Seneca  tribe  of  Iroquois)  40,  124. 
"Two  per  cent,  fund,"  212. 
Vandalia,  111.,  National  road  ends  at,  218. 
Vandalia,  Ind.,  former  town,  215,  224. 
Vernon,  Morgan's  raid  at,  144,  147,  148,  169,  170. 
Versailles,  Morgan's  raid  at,  148,  158,  172,  174. 
Vienna,  Morgan's  raid  at,  144,  147,  165,  166. 
Vigo  County,  National  road  in,  221. 
Vincennes,  Canadian  fief,  described,  6-7 ;  original  grant  of,  25,  29, 

31-3. 
Vincennes,  Ind.,  identity  of  founder  of,  3-126;  bibliography  of,  127; 

founding  of,  89-94;  letters  from  founder,  92-97;  troops  from  in 

Chickasaw    war,    98-105 ;    capital,    242 ;    health    conditions,    273 ; 

health   ordinance,    274 ;    fire    prevention,    282-3 ;    common    name, 

322 ;  Indians  watch,  349-360 ;  council  at,  360. 


544  INDEX 

Vital  statistics,  first  in  Indiana,  276 ;  state  collection  of,  287-8. 
Wabash  river,  French  desire  post  on,  85-90;  confused  with  lower 

Ohio,  87,  89;  National  road  crossing,  218;  bridge  over,  221. 
Washington    County,    unusual    stature    in,    367-447;    account   of    by 

Morris,  373-402;  account  of  by  Stevens,  440-7. 
Water  works,  first  at  Madison,  279;  at  Brookville,  281. 
Watling's  Island,  discovery  by  Columbus,  465,  480. 
Wayne  County  Turnpike  Co.,  235. 
Weas,  Miami  Indian  tribe,  locate  on  Wabash,  83 ;  French  influence 

on,  84,  88;  led  to  Post  Vincennes  (Piankeshaw  tribe)  by  Sieur 

de  Vincennes,  90;  Sieur  de  Linquetot  with,  104. 
Weisburg,  Morgan's  raid  at,  148. 
"Western  National  road."     See  National  road,  214. 
"Western  Sun,"  271,  273,  282. 

Wheeling,  W.  Va.,  travel  at,  213 ;  road  west  from,  214. 
Whetzell's  settlement,  243. 
White  Lick  creek,  217. 

White  river,  National  road  bridge  over,  220-1. 
Whitewater,  217. 
Women,  frontier  life  of,  247;  early  customs  at  Fort  Wayne,  299,  314, 

318-9,  321,  328,  333-5,  337,  343,  353. 
World  war,  stature  of  American  troops  in,  437-9. 
Zanesville,  National  road  at,  215 ;  tavern  at,  230. 


INDEX  OF  NAMES 


Abbott,  James,  316,  327,  334,  340, 
354,  357. 

Abbott,  Elizabeth,  316. 

Adams,  William,  281. 

Adhemar,  Mr.  and  Mrs.,  306, 
309,  310,  313,  314,  315,  316, 
317,  318,  319,  321,  325,  328, 
333,  334,  335,  337,  338,  339, 
434,  348,  349,  351,  352,  353, 
354,    355,    357,    360. 

Allen,  Saul,  282. 

Allison,  ,  279. 

Alspaugh,  David  M.,  396. 

Ames,  Bishop  E.  R.,  259. 

Armstrong,  Duff,  521. 

Armstrong,  Capt.  John,  306. 

Arnold,  Isaac  N.,  486,  501,  512, 
523. 

Aton,  John,  388. 

Baby,  Duperron,  324,  348. 

Baker,  Conrad,  207. 

Baker,  Sen.  Edward  D.,  494. 

Baker,  Henry,  387. 

Barbour,  Lucian,  189,  196,  197. 

Baril,  Indian  chief,  74-5. 

Barnett,  Adam,  388. 

Barnett,  Harry,  397. 

Barthelemy,  Mr.  and  Mrs.,  311, 
317,  333,  349,  350. 

Basye,  Lismund,  256. 

Bates,  Hervey,  254. 

Bates,  Mrs.  Hervey,  253-4. 

Baxter,  Dr.  J.  H.,  367-9,  370, 
413-420. 

Beaconfield,  Lord,  quoted,  291. 

Beckwith,  Judge  H.  W.,  514. 

Beers,  P.,  stage  line  of,  226. 

Begin,  Louis,  24. 

Benac,  Capt.  J.  Porlier,  303,  304. 

Benac,  Pierre,  marries  Marie 
Charlotte  Bissot,  16;  buys 
land,  29. 

Bennett,  J.  B.,  500. 

Berry,  Wm.  F.,  Lincoln's  part- 
ner, 488. 


Beste,  J.  Richard,  235. 

Bienville,  Gov.,  quoted,  95-7; 
declares  war  on  Chickasaws, 
98;  defeated,  99;  quoted,  104. 

Birkbeck,  Morris,  371. 

Bissonet,  Francois,  buys  lands 
of  Bissot,  44. 

Bissot,  Angelique,  marries  Jean 
Baptiste  Poitevin  de  la  Sal- 
monais,  20. 

Bissot,  Catherine,  marries  Eti- 
enne  Charest,  14. 

Bissot,  Catherine  (2),  18. 

Bissot,  Charles  Francois,  mar- 
riage, 16;  sketch  of,  28-31. 

Bissot,  Charlotte,  marries 
Jacques  de  Lafontaine  de  Bel- 
cour,   19. 

Bissot,  Claire  Charlotte,  becomes 
nun,  17. 

Bissot,  Claire  Francois,  marries 
Louis  Jolliet,  14. 

Bissot,  de  la  Riviere  Francois, 
marriage,  11;  children,  12-17; 
sketch,  21-28;  grantee  of  fief 
of  Vincennes,  28. 

Bissot,  Francois  Etienne,  19. 

Bissot,  Francois  Joseph,  marries 
Marie  Lambert  Dumont,  19; 
sketch  of,  76-80. 

Bissot,  Francois  Marie,  Sieur  de 
Vincennes,  takes  the  name  of 
Margane,  3 ;  son  of  Jean  Bap- 
tiste Bissot,  17;  children  of, 
18 ;  record  of  birth,  81 ;  sketch, 
81-105;  with  the  Ouyatanons, 
83-4;  establishes  Post  Vin- 
cennes, 90;  letters  from,  92-4; 
joins  in  war  on  Chickasaws, 
97,  99;  date  of  death,  101-3; 
salary,  91. 

Bissot,  Genevieve,  marries  Louis 
Maheu,  12;  breach  of  promise 
suit,   13. 

Bissot,  Guillaume,  15. 


546 


INDEX 


Bissot,  Jean,  19. 

Bissot,  Jeanne,  marries  Philippe 
de  Valrennes,  18. 

Bissot,  Jean  Baptiste,  Sieur  de 
Vincennes,  marries  Marguer- 
ite Forrestier,  17;  sketch  of, 
31-75 ;  illicit  liquor  trade,  35- 
42 ;  pardoned,  43 ;  services  at 
seige  of  Detroit,  45-70;  locates 
at  site  of  Fort  Wayne,  71-2 ; 
dies  and  is  buried  there,  73-5 ; 
early  station  with  Miamis,  St. 
Joseph  river,  38-9 ;  record  of 
marriage,  80. 

Bissot,  Jean  Francois,  12. 

Bissot,  Joseph,  19. 

Bissot,  Louise,  wife  of  Seraphin 
Margane  de  Lavaltrie,  12. 

Bissot,  Louise,  20. 

Bissot,  Louise  Claire,  marries 
Jean  Fournel,  19. 

Bissot,  Marguerite  Catherine,  18. 

Bissot,  Marie,  marries  (1) 
Claude  Porlier,  and  (2) 
Jacques   Gourdeau,   15. 

Bissot,  Marie  (2),  20. 

Bissot,  Marie  Charlotte,  marries 
Pierre  Benac,  16. 

Bissot,  Marie  Charlotte  (2), 
marries  Jean  Pierre  Francois 
Verderic,  20. 

Bissot,  Marie  Louise,  marries 
Nicolas   Boisseau,   17. 

Bissot,  Michel,  18. 

Bissot,  Pierre,  18. 

Black  Bird,  344,  346. 

Blake,  James,  232,  249,  250,  256. 

Blake,  Mrs.  James,  250. 

Blanchet,  Joseph,  305. 

Blodgett,  Judge  H.  W.,  506. 

Bloomfield,  Lot,  259. 

Blue  Jacket,  Shawnee  chief,  328, 
333,  335,  353. 

Blythe,  Benj.  I.,  245,  257. 

Bobadilla,  Francisco,  sends  Co- 
lumbus in  chains,  475 ;  death 
of,  476. 

Bolton,  Nathaniel,  232-3. 

Bolton,  Sara  T.,  232-3. 

Bonaparte,  Jerome,  245. 


Boone,  Daniel,  385. 

Bowles,  Dr.  Wm.  A.,  139. 

Braddock,  Gen.  Edward,  210. 

Bradley,  Mrs.  Henry,  249. 

Bracken  ridge,  John,  485. 

Bradley,  John  H.,  189. 

Breeden,  Bryant,  misleads  Rebel 
raiders,  138. 

Brenton,  Rev.  Robert,  261. 

Brewer,  Justice  David  J.,  515. 

Brock,  Alexander,  397. 

Brooks,  Dr.  W.  H.,  279. 

B  rough,  John,  378,  440,  444. 

Brown,  Adam,  303. 

Brown,  Edmund  R.,  Dept.  Com. 
G.  A.  R.,  421. 

Brown,  Hiram,  189. 

Brown,  Howard,  390. 

Browning,  Edmund,  232. 

Browning,  Orville  H.,  494,  503. 

Buckner,  ,  255. 

Buffkins,  John  C,  206. 

Bunch,  John,  412,  413. 

Bunn,  John  W.,  520. 

Burton,  Clarence  M.,  299. 

Bush,  Rev.  George,  263. 

Buskirk,  Capt.  David  V.  ("tallest 
man  in  the  Union  army"),  367, 
412,  422,  423 ;  sketch,  425-432 ; 
children  of,  427. 

Buskirk,  Judge  George  A.,  429, 
430. 

Buskirk,  Isaac  (Van),  revolu- 
tionary soldier,  428-9. 

Buskirk,  Lieut.  Isaac,  366,  430. 

Buskirk,  Sergt.  John,  366,  430. 

Buskirk,  Judge  Samuel,  429. 

Butler,  Amos,  282. 

Butler,  John  M.,  207. 

Butler,  Ovid,  189,  192,  194,  259. 

Cadwalader,  David,  396. 

Calhoun,  John,  488. 

Callaway,  James  H.,  394. 

Callaway,  Micajah,  385-6,  394. 

Callaway,  Noble,  394. 

Campbell,  Maria,  430. 

Cannehous,  Jean,  330. 

Captain  John,  Indian,  265. 

Capt.  Johnny,  Shawnee  chief. 
312,  314,  340,  354. 


INDEX 


547 


Carr.  George  W.,  197. 

Carter,  Mrs.  Thos.,  257,  258. 

Caven,  John,  189,  196. 

Celoron  de  Blainville,  Pierre  Jo- 
seph, expedition  of  in  1749, 
73-5. 

Celoron,  Capt,  317,  319,  325, 
328,  333,  334,  335,  349. 

Chachagouache  (i  e.  the  Garter 
Snake),   Indian   chief,  66. 

Chapin,  Dr.  Charles  V,  287. 

Charest,  Etienne,  marries  Cath- 
erine Bissot,  14;  buys  lands  of 
Jean  Baptiste  Bissot,  33. 

Chase,  Salmon  P.,  527. 

Charles,  Samuel,  217. 

Chevalier,  Pierre,  297,  348. 

Chinn,  Miss  Patsy,  252,  253. 

Cicott,  Mr.  and  Mrs.,  335,  336, 
337,  340,  341,  342,  348,  349, 
350,  352,  358. 

Clairemont,  Pierre,  331,  343,  348. 

Clark,  Gen.  Geo.  Rogers,  211, 
300,  306. 

Clark,  George,  396. 

Clark,  Marston  G.,  386. 

Clay,  Henry,  and  National  road, 
213;  at  Richmond,  230;  at 
Plainfield,  234;  estimate  of, 
266. 

Coburn,  Gen.  John,  197. 

Coe,  Dr.  Isaac,  263,  264. 

Coffin,  James,  388. 

Cole,  George  S.,  511. 

Collins,  Andrew,  276. 

Colgrove,  Gen.  Silas,  412,  425, 
427. 

Columbus,  Christopher,  contract 
with  Ferdinand  and  Isabella, 
451,  452;  education  of,  453-7; 
marriage,  455 ;  not  aided  by 
Portgual  or  England,  457-8; 
appeal  to  Spain,  459-464;  first 
voyage,  464-470;  knowledge  of 
ores  and  spices,  469 ;  second 
voyage,  470-2 ;  third  voyage, 
472-5;  fourth  voyage,  476-9; 
ingratitude  to,  475,  479 ;  men- 
tal attainments,  480. 


Columbus,  Ferdinand,  452,  454. 
455. 

Compton,  Dr.  John  W.,  287. 

Conner,  Alexander  H.,  204-6 

Conner,  William,  205. 

Cool,  Dr.  Jonathan,  263. 

Cory,  Judge  Samuel,  186,  188. 

Couillard,  Marie,  11. 

Coustan,  Jean,  331. 

Couture,  Guillaume,  interpreter, 
partner  of  Bissot  de  la  Ri- 
viere, 22,  23. 

Cravens,  Rev.  Wm,  248,  381-2. 
440. 

Crumbaugh,  Jacob  R.,  261. 

Curry,  Hiram  W.,  259. 

Curry,  John,  388. 

Cutshaw,  Townsend,  395. 

D'Ailleboust  de  Argenteuil,  ad- 
venture of,  109-10. 

Dartaguiette,  Commandant  in 
Illinois,  96;  summoned  to 
Chickasaw  war,  97-8;  killed, 
99-101. 

Davis,  Judge  David,  503,  504, 
505,  506,  513,  516,  524. 

Davis,  Oliver  L.,  503,  505. 

Dawalt,  Commodore,  397. 

Dawalt,  James  D.,  397. 

De  Boisbriand,  Dugue,  urges 
post  on  Wabash,  85 ;  instruc- 
tions to,  86. 

De  Catalogne,  Gedeon,  quoted, 
68. 

Deer,  The,  Indian,  314. 

De  Lafontaine  de  Gelcour, 
Jacques,  marries  Charlotte 
Bissot,  19. 

De  Lauzon,  Gov.  Jean,  24. 

De  Linquetot,  Sieur,  commands 
"among  Miamis  and  Oeyata- 
nons,"  104. 

Demoiselle,  Indian  chief,  74-5. 

Denney,  Claborne,  397,  402. 

Denney,  Flanders,  397,  402. 

Denney,  Harrison,  395. 

Denney,  Joel,  395. 

Denney,  Joseph,  395. 

Denney,  Thomas.  378-9,  440-2. 

Dennis,  David,  3S8. 


548 


INDEX 


De  Ramezay,  Gov.  of  Montreal, 
quoted,  35. 

Desgly,  Ensign,  87,  100. 

De  Valrennes,  Philippe  Clement 
du  Valult,  marries  Jeanne 
Bissot,  18. 

De  Vaudreuil,  Gov.,  quoted,  38, 
40-4,  82-4. 

De  Walt,  Col.  Henry,  387. 

Dillon,  John  B.,  189,  193,  196, 
201. 

Dinwiddie,  Gov.  Robert,  210. 

Dorsey,  Hazel,  Lincoln's  teach- 
er, 485. 

Doughty,  Major  John,  308. 

Douglas,  Stephen  A.,  494,  499, 
513,  517,  518,  527. 

Dowling,  Dr.  W.  H.,  284. 

Drouet  de  Richardville,  100. 

Dubois,  L.,  359. 

Du  Buisson,  Sieur,  commands 
at  Detroit,  44,  69;  report  on 
siege,  45-71 ;  commands  at 
Post  Miamis,  72,  82. 

Duckworth,  Col.  John,  447. 

Dufresne,  Mr.  and  Mrs.,  323, 
327,  329,  3,  35,  39,  348,  53. 

Duke,  Gen.  Basil,  quoted,  136, 
143-5,  166-7;  commands  under 
Gen.  Morgan,  156,  171. 

Dumay,  Jacques,  330. 

Dunlap,  Dr.  Livingston,  263. 

Du  Poisson,  Father  Paul,  quot- 
ed, 16. 

Du  Tisne,  Ensign,  100,  121-2. 

Dye,  John  T.,  207. 

Elder,  Dr.  E.  S.,  287. 

Elliott,  Byron  K.,  207,  232. 

Elliott,  Matthew,  306. 

Elliott,  Gen.  W.  J..  232. 

Ellsworth,  Henry  W.,  207. 

Elrod,  Eli,  395. 

Evans,  Dr.  John,  279. 

Ewing,  James  S.,  522. 

Ferguson,  Kilby,  196. 

Finch,  Fabias  M.,  207. 

Filson,  John,  307. 

Fishback,  Wm.  P.,  202,  207. 

Fisher,  F.  R.,  519. 

Fleenor,  Abram,  388. 


Fletcher,  Calvin,  189,  192,  193, 
201,  251,  259,  260. 

Fletcher,  Mrs.  Calvin,  notes 
from  diary  of,  247-267. 

Fletcher,  Miles,  264. 

Flood,  Dr.  Jonathan,  pursues 
Gen.  Morgan,  179-180. 

Foot,  Obed,  259,  261. 

Fordham,  Elias  Pym,  245-6. 

Forestier,  Marie  Madeline,  god- 
mother of  Sieur  de  Vincennes, 
81-2. 

Forsythe,  J.,  354. 

Fouche,  332. 

Fournel,  Jean,  marries  Louise 
Claire  Bissot,   19. 

Frontenac,  Count,  speech  to  In- 
dians, 34;  quoted,  108;  sends 
messages,  109-10. 

Furnas,  John,  217. 

Gamelin,  Pierret,  notary  at  Vin- 
cennes, 359. 

Gates,  Uriah,  252. 

Gibson,  Hugh,  275. 

Girty,  George,  16,  339,  357. 

Girty,  James,  316,  340,  345. 

Girty,  Simon,  316. 

Glenn,  Rev.  Peter,  killed  in 
Morgan's  raid,  159. 

Godfroy,  Jacques,  330. 

Godman,  T.  J.,  281. 

Good,  Richard,  259. 

Gooding,  David,  wounded  in 
Morgan's  raid,  182. 

Goodwin,  Septemas,  388. 

Gordon,  Isaac,  394. 

Gordon,  Jonathan  W.,  204-5. 

Gorman,  Charles,  402. 

Gould,  Dr.  B.  A.,  367-369,  402- 
13,  414,  417. 

Green,  Richard,  402. 

Gregg,  Harvey,  259. 

Gregory,  Col.  Samuel  O.,  412. 

Griffith,  Dr.,  216-7. 

Gros  Loup  (Mohican  Indian), 
338. 

Guay,  Jean,  23. 

Guion  de  Rouvray,  Joseph,  30. 

Gurley,  Rev.  Phineas  D.,  263. 

Guyon,  Simon,  25. 


INDEX 


549 


Hack,  Mrs.  Oren  S.  (Elizabeth 
Miller),  article  by,  450-480. 

Hacknev,  Wm.   Patrick,  515. 

Hall,  Reginald,  207. 

Hamilton,  Col.  Henry,  317. 

Hammond,  Gov.  Abraham  A., 
1S9. 

Hammond,  Rev.  Rezin,  248. 

Hardin,  John  J.,  494. 

Harding,  Robert,  260. 

Harmar,  Gen.  Josiah,  302,  308. 

Harris,  Addison  C,  207. 

Harrison,  Benjamin,  207. 

Harrison,   Christopher,  244-6. 

Harrison,  Wm.  H.,  234. 

Harvey,  Jonathan  S.,   189. 

Hattabaugh,  George,  387. 

Hattabaugh,  William,  395. 

Hawkins,  John,  259,  261. 

Hawn,  Dr.  E.  R.,  287. 

Hay,  Henry,  294;  identity  of, 
299 ;  mission  to  Miamitown, 
300;  journal  of,  303-361. 

Hay,  Major  Jehu,  captured  by 
Gen.  Clark,  300. 

Hay,  John,  315. 

Heffren,  Delos,  393. 

Heffren,  Horace,  393. 

Henderson,  Dr.  Harvey  D.,  396. 

Henderson,  Samuel,  232. 

Hendricks,  Abram  W.,  207. 

Hendricks,  Thomas  A.,  207. 

Herndon,  Archie  G.,  498. 

Herndon,  William  H.,  Lincoln's 
partner,  491,  498,  500,  518. 

Hill,  Frederick  Trevor,  492,  514, 
531. 

Hester,  C.  P.,  279. 

Heth,  William,  killed  in  Mor- 
gan's raid,  160. 

Hiestand,  Isaac  H.,  395. 

Hill,  Robert,  216. 

Hines,  Capt.  Thomas,  Rebel  offi- 
cer, invades  Indiana,  135-9. 

Hix,  Richard,  394. 

Hobbs,  Elisha.  388. 

Hobbs,  Wm.,  388. 

Hobson,  Gen.  Edward,  report  of 
Morgan's  raid,  142-3 ;  at 
Mauckport,    151,     154-5,     156; 


pursuit   of   Morgan,    163,    175, 

177. 
Hodge,  Prof.  Hugh  Lenox,  273, 

note. 
Hodges,  Col.  Albert  G.,  527. 
Hodges,  Mrs.  Laura  F.,  240. 

Hogden,  ,  251. 

Holliday,  Rev.  Wm.  A.,  263. 
Holmes,  Dr.  Oliver  Wendell, 

273,  note. 
Holmes,  Wm.,  217. 
Hord,  Oscar  B.,  207. 
Horse  Jockey   (Indian),  343. 
House,  John  H.,  397. 
Housh,  Andrew,  384-5. 
Housh,  George,  384. 
Howe,  Judge  D.  W.,  quoted,  243. 
Howland,  Caroline,  198. 
Howland,  Hewitt,  198. 
Howland,  John  D.,  189,  196,  198. 
Howland,  Louis,  198. 
Hubbard,  Rev.  Aaron,  379-381. 

Huddleston,  ,  tavern,  231. 

Hunter,  Andrew  J.,  521. 
Hurty,  Dr.  J.  N.,  287,  288. 
Huston,  Alexander,  388. 
Huston,  Benjamin,  388. 
Huston,  Samuel,  388. 
Ironside,   George,  319,   321,   325, 

334,    336,   339,    342,    344,    347, 

350,   351,  353,  356. 
Isabella,  Queen  of  Spain,  be- 
friends   Columbus,    451,    459, 

463,  476. 
Jameson,  Dr.  Patrick,  279. 
Jamison,  Wm.  G.,  395. 
Jefferson,  Thomas,  212,  213. 
Jenck's  distillery,  217-8. 
Jennings,  Jonathan,  bill  locating 

National  road,  215  ;  and  early 

Indianapolis,  241,  245. 
Johns,  Mrs.  Jane,  513. 
Johnson,  Adam  P.,  Rebel  guer- 

rila  , invades  Indiana,  134-5. 
Johnson,  Gen.  Bushrod,  in  Mor- 
gan's raid,  156. 
Johnson,  Homer,  218. 
Johnson,  Capt.  Zephaniah,  388. 
Joliet,   Louis,   marries   Claire 

Francoise   Bissot,    14;  partner 


550 


INDEX 


of    Charles    Francois    Bissot, 

29;    leases    seignory    of    Min- 

gan,    30 ;    guardian    of    Jean 

Baptiste    Bissot,    32;    partner- 
ship, 76. 
Jones,  Peter,  282. 
Judkins,  Dr.  Wm,  286. 
Kemp,  Godlove,  388. 
Ketcham,  Mrs.  Jane  M.,  263. 
Ketcham,  Col.  John,  200. 
Ketcham,  John  L.,  189,  196,  197, 

200. 
Kidd,  T.  W.  S.,  514. 
King,  Dr.  A.  W.,  382,  384,  390, 

391. 
King,  Dr.  W.  F.,  paper  on  "One 

Hundred    Years    in    Public 

Health  in  Indiana,"  268-291. 
Kinzie,  John,  310,  311,  314,  315, 

316,    318,    319,    321,    324,    341, 

342,    345,    346,   347,    350,    351, 

353,    355,    358,    359. 

Kirk, ,  279. 

Kissis    (i.  e.   The   Sun),   Indian 

chief,  62. 
Knight,  Jonathan,  commissioner 

for  National  road,  215,  220. 
Koerner,  Judge  Gustave,  519. 
Kopp,    Capt.    Peter,    366,    424-5, 

427. 
La  Balme,  Col.  Mottin  de,  306, 

309. 
Lacey,  Judge  Lyman,  507. 
Lafontaine,  Louis  de,   11,  12. 
La  Fontaine,  Francois,  297,  338, 

339,  350,  353. 
La  Lache  (Indian),  329,  331. 
Lalande,  Gayon  Jacques  de,   11. 
Lambert,  Eustache,  24. 
Lamon,  Ward  H,  506. 
Lamoureux  fils,  331. 
Lamothe,     Cadillac,     charges 

against    Sieur    de    Vincennes, 

35-8,  39. 
Lamoureux,  330. 
Lamyma,  should  be  Lamwa,  i.  e. 

The    Dog),    Indian    chief,    46, 

62. 
Lapp,    Peter,    mill    burned    in 

Morgan's  raid,   159. 


Las     Casas,    quoted,    452,    453, 

457,  466,  476. 
Lasselle,  Antoine,  297,  322,  323, 

326,  327,    330,    332,   333,    343, 
347. 

Lasselle,  Baptiste,  318,  334,  336, 

337,    342,    346;    married,    349, 

352,  353. 
Lasselle,  Coco,  329,  330,  353. 
Lasselle,  Francois,  337,  342,  346, 

353. 
Lawler,  John  C,  395. 
Lee,  James,  379,  440,  443. 
Li'Enfile,  Martin,  23. 
Le  Gardeur  de  Courtmanche,  Lt. 

Augustin,  112. 
Le  Gris  (Indian  chief),  311,  313, 

316,    320,    321,    323,    324,    326, 

327,  329,    330,    331,    332,    333, 
336,    337,   355. 

Leith,  George,  303,  305,  319,  323, 
325,  332,  334,  342,  343,  344, 
347,  350,  351,  353,  355,  356, 
361. 

Le  Jollie   (Indian),  327. 

Le  Petit,  Father  M  a  t  h  u  r  i  n  , 
quoted,  102. 

Levering,  Julia  Henderson,  228. 

Levington,  Noah,  255. 

Lincoln,  Abraham,  boyhood  in 
Indiana,  484-6;  early  life  in 
Illinois,  486-9 ;  law  studies, 
489-490 ;  cases  in  Supreme 
Court,  492,  531-5 ;  partnerships 
of,  495-8;  descriptions  of,  500- 
502 ;  life  on  the  circuit,  503- 
511;  hospitality  of,  512;  fees 
of,  513,  521 ;  anecdotes  of,  514- 
6;  debate  with  Douglas,  517- 
8;  style  of  argument,  519-25; 
student  of  constitution,  526-7; 
kindliness  of,  528-9. 

Linder,  Usher  F.,  503,  508,  521. 

Liston,  Jonathan  A.,  189. 

Little  Egg  (Indian),  331. 

Little,  John,  232. 

Little  Turkey   (Indian),  327. 

Little  Turtle  (Indian),  intro- 
duces   inoculation    for    small- 


INDEX 


551 


pox,  278;  sketch,  309,  320,  321, 

324,  327,  328,  355. 
Logan,  Col.  Ezekiel  D.,  387. 
Logan,  Gen.  John  A.,  494. 
Logan,  Garrett  W.,  388. 
Logan,  Judge   Stephen  T.,  Lin- 
coln's partner,  491,  496-8,  503. 
Loizel,  Toussaint,  quoted,  101. 
Longpre,  Philippe,  father-in-law 

of  Sieur  de  Vincennes,  18. 
Lorraine,  350,  356,  357. 
Love,  Gen.  John,  192. 
Luck,  Benjamin,  395. 
McCarmic,  Dr.  Andrew  S.,  286. 
McCarty,  Enoch,  282. 
McCarty,  Nicholas,  257. 
McClernand,  Gen.  John  A.,  494. 
McClung,  Rev.  John,  260-1. 
McCormick,  Arthur,  304. 
McCormick,  John,  242,  248. 
McCulloch,  Hugh,  221. 
McDonald,  David,  207. 
McDonald,  Jos.  E.,  207. 
McDonald,    trader    at    Grand 

Glaize,  304-5,  341,  361. 
McFarland,  Demas,  262. 
McGeorge,  Samuel,  248-9. 
Maclntire,  Thomas,  263. 
McKee,    Alexander,    Indian 

agent,  297,  316,  317,  324,  340. 
McKee,  Thomas,  350. 
McLean,  Justice  John  R.,  492. 
McVey.  Hugh  O'Neal,  204. 
Macy,  David,  189. 
Maisonville,  Toop,  330. 
The    Snake    (Indian),   333,   353, 

354,   357. 
Major,  Judge  Stephen,  198. 
Makatemangouas     (i.    e.     Black 

Loon),  Indian  chief,  45-6. 
Makisabie,  Indian  chief,  49,  66. 
Makouandeby,   Indian  chief,  58. 
March,  Walter,   197. 
Marchand,  Louis,  33. 
Margane,  Francois.     See  Bissot, 

Francois  Marie. 
Margane,     Francois,     Sieur     de 

Batilly,  godfather  of  Sieur  de 

Vincennes,    81-2;     sketch    of, 

110-1. 


Margane,  des  Forets  et  de  La 
Valtrie  Pierre,  sketch  of,  122- 
127. 

Margane  de  Lavaltrie,  Seraphin, 
marries  Louise  Bissot,  12 ; 
sketch  of,  105-121;  officer  in 
Regiment  de  Carignan,  106-8  ; 
children  of,  109-112. 

Marie  Louisa.  See  Mrs.  Rich- 
ard ville,  321. 

Markland,  Augustus,  397,  402. 

Markland,  Matthew,  397,  402. 

Markland,  Tony,  402. 

Markland,  Wm,  397,  402. 

Martin,  Mrs.  Betsy,  251. 

Martin,  S.  Wesley,  502. 

May,  George,  388. 

May,  Ruble,  402. 

Mears,  Dr.  George  W.,  188. 

Medlock,  Cam.,  395. 

Medlock,  Henry  W.,  397-9. 

Medlock,  Reuben,  395. 

Meigs,  Prof.  Chas.  D.,  273,  note. 

Mendez,  Diego,  478. 

Merrill,  Samuel,  244,  256. 

Metcalf,  Dr.  C.  N.,  287. 

Miller,  Elizabeth  (Mrs.  Oren  S. 
Hack),  article  by,  450-480. 

Mills,  Caleb,  259. 

Milroy,  John,  218,  220. 

Mitchell,  Dr.  S.  G.,  262,  277. 

Mobley,  Chas.  W.,  394. 

Moniz,  Philippa,  marries  Colum- 
bus, 453. 

Montrayille,  297. 

Montroill,  robbery  by,  356. 

Moores,  Mrs.  Chas.  W.,  trans- 
lates documents,  8. 

Moores,  Hon.  Merrill,  finds 
Pierre  Georges  Roy,  6-7. 

Morgan,  John,  Confederate  gen- 
eral ;  raid  in  Indiana,  133- 
183 ;  preceding  troubles,  133- 
9;  Shackelford's  account,  141; 
Gen.  Hobson's  account,  142-3 ; 
Basil  Duke's  account,  143- 
5  ;  Morgan's  forces,  145  ;  route 
followed,  146-9;  nature  of 
country  raided,  150-2;  crosses 
Ohio    river,     153-6;    prepara- 


552 


INDEX 


tions  for  defense,  157-8;  de- 
tails of  raid,  159-178;  cost  to 
state,  182. 

Morgan,  R.  P.,  494. 

Morris,  Caleb  W.,  394. 

Morris,  Charles,  397,  402. 

Morris,  Frank,  397,  402. 

Morris,  Fred,  401,  402. 

Morris,  George,  397,  401,  402. 

Morris,  Harvey,  368;  article  by, 
373-402. 

Morris,  J.,  351. 

Morris,  Jehosaphat,  387. 

Morris,  Jehosaphat  M.,  Jr.,  395. 

Morris,  John,  401,  402. 

Morris,  Morris,  255. 

Morris,  Pritchard,  387. 

Morris,  Gen.  Thomas  A.,  255. 

Morris,  Capt.  Thos.,  rescue  of, 
313. 

Morrison,  James,  189,  190. 

Morton,  Gov.  Oliver  P.,  proc- 
lamation in  Morgan's  raid, 
156-8;  borrows  money,  260. 

Muller,  Johannes,  Calendarium 
of,  479. 

Munroe,  Henry  C,  390. 

Murray,  Major  Patrick,  297,  300, 
312,  332,  340. 

Neale,  T.  M.,  488. 

Newby,  Albert,  402. 

Newcomb,  Horatio  C,  189. 

Noble,  James,  259. 

Noble,  Gov.  Noah,  276. 

Nowland,  Mrs.  Matthias,  247. 

Nowland,  Sarah  Anne,  248. 

O'Kane,  Elder  John,  194. 

O'Neal,  Hugh,  189,  203. 

Otwell,  Lt.  Francis,  425. 

Ouabimanitou  (i.  e.  White  Ma- 
nito),  Indian  chief,  62. 

Owen,  Robert  Dale,  234. 

Paillet  (Payet),  Mr.  and  Mrs., 
310,311,335,  337,  349,350,354. 

Pantonne,  Etienne,  330. 

Pamoussa,  Indian  chief,  46,  62. 

Parker,  Benj.  S.,  228. 

Parks,  Judge  Samuel  C,  507, 
560. 

Partridge,  Dr.  J.  M.,  287. 


Patterson,  Elizabeth,  245. 

Patterson,  Mrs.  Jane,  248, 

Paxton,  Mrs.  James,  249. 

Payet,  Louis,  311. 

Payette,  Diaum,  330. 

Paynter,  Caleb,  394. 

Paynter,  Christian  L.,  394. 

Paynter,  Dr.  Charles  B.,  40L 

Paynter,  George,  394. 

Paynter,  Harry,  394. 

Paynter,  John,  394. 

Paynter,  Lawrence  W.,  402. 

Pecan,  Miami  chief,  313. 

Pecaudy  de  contrecoeur,  Capt., 
73. 

Peck,  Hy,  394. 

Perier,  Gov.,  instructions  to  con- 
cerning Post  Vincennes,  87-8. 

Perrot,  Nicolas,  quoted,  107. 

Perrot,  Pierre,  23. 

Peshewa,  Indian  chief.  See  Jean 
Baptiste  Richardville. 

Petite  Face  (Indian),  329,  331. 

Phillipps,  John,  307. 

Pitcher,  John,  Lincoln's  teacher, 
485,  490. 

Pogue,  Widow  (of  George),  217. 

Poitevin  de  la  Salmonais,  Jean 
Baptiste,  marries  Angelique 
Bissot,  20. 

Polk,  James  K.,  234. 

Pope,  Judge  Nathaniel,  492. 

The  Porcupine  (Indian),  329, 
330  337 

Porter,  Aibert  G.,  189,  287. 

Pratt,  Lieut.  John,  307. 

Proctor,  Rev.  David  C,  263. 

Prow,  Christian,  388. 

Prow,  Christian,  Jr.,  395. 

Pugh,  John,  276. 

Quaife,  M.  M.,  article  on  Fort 
Wayne  in  1790,  293-361,  310. 

Quarles,  Wm,  189. 

Quintanilla,  Don  Alonzo  de,  be- 
friends Columbus,  458-9. 

Rainbease,  Henri,  330. 

Ralston,  Alexander,  245-6. 

Rand,  Frederick,  207. 

Ranjard,  Mrs.,  310,  316,  321,  325, 
333,  334. 


INDEX 


553 


Rariden,  James,  259. 
Rariden,  Mary,  201. 
Ray,  James  M.,  254. 
Ray,  Col.  John  W.,  248. 
Raymond,  M.  de,  commands  at 

Kiskakon,  74. 
Ream,  Capt.  Charles,  412. 
Redfield,  Capt.  J.  B.,  413. 
Richardson,  Wm.  A.,  494. 
Richardville,  Drouet  de,  100. 
Richardville,   Jean    B  a  p  t  i  s  t  e  , 

chief,  314,  337,  339,   342,  346, 

352,  353,  360. 
Richardville,    Mrs.,    mother    of 

Chief     Jean      Baptiste.     314; 

sister    of    Little    Turtle,    321, 

322,  360. 
Ridge,  Mrs.  John  T.  R.,  431. 
Riley,  James  Whitcomb,  228,  241. 
Riney,    Zachariah,    Lincoln's 

teacher,  485. 
Ringo,  Morgan,  221. 
Rivard  (Rivarre),  Mr.  and  Mrs., 

309,  310,  316,  318,  328,  333,  349. 
Robertson,  Jack,  350. 
Robertson,   Wm.,   300,   306,   319, 

324,  348,  350. 
Robideau,  335,  347. 
Rodman,  Admiral  Hugh,  382. 
Rodman,  Frank,  402. 
Rodman,  Hugh,  382-3,  394. 
Rodman,  James,  382,  383-4,  394. 
Rodman,  Jasper  N.,  394. 
Rodman,  John,  382,  391. 
Rodman,  Gen.  Thos.  J.,  368,  382, 

394. 
Rodman,  Wm.,  382. 
Rose,  Chauncey,  235. 
Rous,  Capt.  Percy,  412. 
Rowland,  John,  388. 
Roy,    Joseph,    S  i  e  u  r    de    Vin- 

cennes,  25. 
Roy,  Pierre  Georges ;  demon- 
strates   identity    of    Sieur    de 

Vincennes,    3 ;    sketch    of,    4 ; 

works   of,   5-6 ;   meeting  with 

Hon.  Merrill  Moores,  6-7. 
Rudolph,  T.  T.,  506. 
Ryan,  Felix,  505,  512. 
Russell.    Col.    Alexander,   251-2. 


258. 
Saguima    (i.  e.  The  Mosquito), 

Indian  chief,  47,  50,  67. 
St.    Ange,    fils,    84;    killed,    100, 

101. 
St.  Ange,  Louis,  104. 
St.   Ange,   pere,   84,   91,   93,  95, 

101. 
St.  Clair,  Gen.  Arthur,  302,  359, 

360. 
Sanders,  Andrew  J.,  413. 
Sayles,  Stephen  D.,  395. 
Schower,    Joseph,    surveyor    of 

National  road,  215. 
Scudder,  Caleb,  264. 
Sebastian,  Wm.,  232. 
Senat,  Father  Antoine,  100,  102. 
Sevenick,  Dr.  B,  279. 
Sevestre,  Charles,  24. 
Shackelford,  Gen.  James  M.,  re- 
port of  Morgan's  raid,   141-2. 
Shanks,  Lewis,  395. 
Sharp,  George,  306,  341,  348,  361. 
Sharpe,  Thomas  H.,  263. 
Sheets,  John,  280-1. 
Sheets,  William,  263. 
Shepherd,  361. 
Sherlock,  356,  357. 
Shields,  Gen.  James  A.,  494. 
Short,  Aaron,  388. 
Short,  Jacob,  388. 
Short,  Madison,  375,  388,  445-6. 
Shrum,  Moses,  395. 
Shull,  Silas,  402. 
Shull,  Volney,  397. 
The      Sirropp      (Syrup-Indian), 

331. 
Smith,  Judge  Daniel  R.,  186,  187. 
Smith,  Elbert,  402. 
Smith,  George,  520. 
Smith,  Lewis  N.,  394. 
Smith,  Dr.  Spencer,  397. 
Smith,  Oliver  H,  189,  190,  191, 

192,  195,  259. 
The  Soldier  (Indian  chief),  329, 

337. 
Soliday,  Daniel,  388. 
Soliday,  Jacob,  389. 
Souder,  Martin,  395. 
Spangler   Vance,  402. 


554 


INDEX 


Speed,  Joshua  F.,  498. 

Spencer,  Rev.  O.  M.,  305,  306, 
310,  319,  333. 

Spigler,  John,  395. 

Stalnaker,  Frank  D,,  197. 

Stanley,  Jesse,  388. 

Stanley,  Olive,  396. 

Starr,  Prof.  Frederic,  371. 

Stevens,  Judge  Stephen  C,  197. 

Stevens,  Dr.  Thaddeus  M.,  287. 

Stevens,  Warden  W,  368,  374; 
article  by,  440-7. 

Stocker,  Dr.,  372. 

Stone,  Judge  Dan,  494,  499. 

Stout,  Corporal  Ira,  412. 

Stout,  Thomas,  Gen.  Morgan's 
treatment  of,  170-1. 

Stover,  Major  Abram,  375-9, 
440-7. 

Strain,  Robert,  388. 

Strong,  Capt.  David,  307,  308. 

Stuart,  Major  John  T.,  487,  491, 
494,  495,  496,  503. 

Sulgrove,  Berry,  quoted,  249. 

Sullivan,  Judge  Jeremiah,  244, 
276. 

Sutton,  Dr.  George,  284. 

Sweett,  Leonard,  503. 

Sweetzer,  James  L.,  196. 

Sweetzer,  Philip,  189. 

Takumwa.  See  Mrs.  Richard- 
ville,  321. 

Talon,  Jean,  Intendant.  god- 
father of  Jean  Baptiste  Bissot, 
31 ;  grants  fief  of  Vincennes, 
32. 

Tappan,  Col.  M.  W,  412. 

Tarbell,  Miss  Ida,  514. 

Tatlock,  Robert,  395. 

Taylor,  Napoleon  B.,  207. 

Taylor,  Robert,  230. 

Terrell,  Gen.  W.  H.  H.,  419. 

Thatcher,  John  Boyd,  quoted, 
460,  467;  acknowledgement  to, 
480. 

Thomas, ,  279. 

Tonty,  Henri  de,  commands  at 
Detroit,  41. 

Toscanelli,  Paola,  and  Colum- 
bus, 456-7,  462,  464. 


Treat,  Judge  Saml.  H.,  492,  504, 
511. 

Tremblais,  327. 

Troxell,  Joseph  Reeder,  205. 

Trueblood,  Benj.  F.,  397. 

Trueblood,  Elwood,  396. 

Trueblood,  Thomas,  396. 

Uppinghouse,  Alfred,  394. 

Uppinghouse,  Brad,  394. 

Uppinghouse,  James,  379,  440, 
442,  445. 

Uppinghouse,  Robert,  394. 

Van  Buren,  Martin,  234. 

Van  Buskirk.     See  Buskirk. 

Vance,  David,  388. 

Vederic,  Jean  Pierre  Francois, 
marries  Marie  Charlotte  Bis- 
sot, 21. 

Vincennes,  Francois  Marie  Bis- 
sot, Sieur  de ;  founder  of  Post 
Vincennes ;  causes  uncertainty 
by  assuming  name  of  godfath- 
er, Francois  Margane,  3.  See 
Bissot. 

Vinnedge.  Dr.  W.  W.,  287. 

Vivie,  357. 

Volant  d'  Hautebourg,  Jean 
Louis,  leases  Mingan  seignory, 
78. 

Walker,  Admiral,  wreck  of 
fleet,  26,  43-4. 

Wallace,  Gov.  David,  199. 

Wallace,  Gen.  Lew,  199. 

Wallace,  William,  199,  207. 

Waloole,  Robert  L.,  189,  196, 
201,  202,  203. 

Washburne,  Elihu  B.,  496. 

Washington,  Augustine,  209-10. 

Washington,  George,  210,  211, 
212. 

Waterman,  Dr.  Luther  D.,  27L 

Werden,  William,  230. 

Weston,  George,  395. 

Weston,  Win,  395. 

Whitcomb,  Gov.  James,  259. 

White,  F.,  286. 

Whitney,  Henry  C,  503. 

Wick,  Daniel  B.,  259. 

Wick,  Judge  Wm.  Watson,  186- 
7,  259. 


INDEX 


555 


Wick,  Mrs.  Win.  W.,  257,  259. 
Williams,  Jacob,  397. 
Wilson,  Mrs.  Alex.,  260. 
Wilson,  Isaac,  247. 
Wilson,  Wm,  402. 
Wishard,  Dr.  Wm.  H.,  265. 
Witherington,  John,  296,  359. 
The  Wolf,  Shawnee  chief,  353. 
Woodard,  Charles,  275. 
Woodburn,  Mrs.  Ann,  248. 


Woollen,   Wm.   Wesley,   quoted, 

187. 
Wright,  Philbert  Marion,  396. 
Wyant,  John,  251-2. 
Yandes,  Daniel,  255-6. 
Yandes,  Simon,  189,  190,  192. 

195,  196. 
Young,  James,  388,  394. 
Young,  Milas,  394-5. 
Zink,  John,  389-390. 


INDIANA  HISTORICAL  SOCIETY  PUBLICATIONS 
VOL.  7  NO.  10 


ABRAHAM   LINCOLN 
LAWYER 


BY 

CHARLES  W.  MOORES 


(Reprinted  from  the  Proceedings  of  the  American  Bar  Association, 
1910,  and  Enlarged.    Reprinted,  1929) 


GREENFIELD,    IND. 

WM.   MITCHELL  PRINTING  CO. 

1922 


